Margarete Schlegel

Yearning for respectability, George finds he cannot escape the influence of his old criminal cohorts. When George refuses to pay "hush money" to the mob, his faithful wife Margarete Schlegel is killed. George resignedly returns to a life of crime, ultimately descending into madness. (answers.com)

This film demonstrates how the universe was comprehended in the 1920s, and how that view was sold to contemporary audiences.

Das Lied ist Aus (The Song Is Ended) is a typical early-talkie German musical in every respect, save one. The story, concerning the lives and loves of show folk, ends unhappily -- and surprisingly so. The doleful denouement didn't seem to have much effect on the film's box-office appeal, since Das Lied ist Aus proved a major moneymaker. (imdb)

A rabbi's son yearns to become an actor, against the wishes of his father.

A gentle orphan discovers life and love in an indifferent adult world.

About a young woman and her tragic love story, which leads her through life as an artist in a traveling circus to the court, which sentences her.