The Avenging Conscience

The Avenging Conscience: or "Thou Shalt Not Kill" is a 1914 silent horror film directed by D. W. Griffith.[1] The film is based on Edgar Allan Poe's 1843 short story "The Tell-Tale Heart" and his 1849 poem "Annabel Lee".[2]

A young man (Henry B. Walthall) interested in the works of Edgar Allan Poe, falls in love with a beautiful woman (Blanche Sweet), but he is prevented by the uncle (Spottiswoode Aitken) that raised him since childhood from pursuing her. Tormented by visions of death and suffering and deciding that murder is the way of things, the young man kills his uncle and builds a wall to hide the body.

The young man's torment continues, this time caused by guilt over murdering his uncle that was overheard by an Italian witness, and he becomes sensitive to slight noises, like the tapping of a shoe or the crying of a bird. The ghost of his uncle begins appearing to him and, as he gradually loses his grip on reality, the police figure out what he has done and chase him down. In the ending sequence, we learn that the experience was all a dream and that his uncle is really alive. They make up, and the nephew gets to marry the sweetheart.

Dennis Schwartz, labeling the film with a grade of B-, labeled it as a film with important historical value as "the first great American horror film."[3]