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A woman holds a dark clasp purse while another hand grips her wrist and a folded paper enters above.

Image: Monocurator · source · Original Monocurator artwork

Drama

The Cheat

TenseBleak Best saved for later · For patient viewers Drama

Debt, secrecy, and coercion tighten around a married woman after private risk-taking gives a predatory man power over her.

Year
1931
Director
George Abbott
Country
United States
Length
74 min
Language
English

What to expect

George Abbott’s remake of Cecil B. DeMille’s 1915 film transfers a famous silent melodrama into pre-Code speech and Tallulah Bankhead’s forceful screen presence.

How to ease in

Watch who controls information in each scene. The drama is less about a single bad decision than about how money and social judgement make disclosure dangerous.

Heads-up

A quick, non-exhaustive note Includes sexual coercion, assault, branding violence, racialised exoticism, marital deception, and victim blaming.
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A secret changes weight depending on who is allowed to name it. I watch the heroine fight not only a man, but the story society is ready to tell about her.

— Momo

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Credits & versions

Version map

Wikidata 74-minute listing 74 min 74 minutes reproduces the single duration stated by the source. The listing does not identify a cut, score, territory, frame rate, source element, or restoration. Source: Wikidata — The Cheat Runtime reference · Checked 2026-08-22

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