Picture Brides (1934)

Four "Picture Brides" from New Orleans arrive in the Brazilian jungle on a riverboat, brought there to marry workers at Lottagrasso, a remote mining site of the Standard Diamond Mines. On the same boat with the "mail-order" brides (Americans Mame Smith and Flo Lane, and Gwen from England and Lena from Europe) is Mary Lee, an innocent, frightened girl who has come to see the mine's brutal supervisor, von Luden, about a job. Knowing von Luden's inhuman reputation, Mame transfers the photo assigning her to Dave Hart to Mary's identification card. Castro, the mail-runner, delivers a letter to von Luden informing him that his partner Hart is wanted in the United States on an embezzlement charge. To protect Mary, Mame presents herself as the job applicant while Mary is introduced to Dave and his fellow supervisors--Peter, Joe, and Bill--as a bride applicant. Dave rescues Mary from a lustful, brutish attack by von Luden. Pretty Mataeo Rogers, half-breed daughter of the camp's drunken doctor, is celebrating her 18th birthday and is lured to von Luden's jungle castle. Later, natives find her body in the swamp. Detectives Steve and Al arrive to extradite Dave.