The Road to Yesterday

The Road to Yesterday is a 1925 American silent romantic drama film directed by Cecil B. DeMille. The film was based on a 1908 play of the same name by Beulah Marie Dix and Evelyn Greenleaf Sutherland and was adapted by Dix and Jeanie MacPherson. Art direction for the film was done by Paul Iribe, Anton Grot, Mitchell Leisen, and Max Parker.

The film is significant because it was Cecil B. DeMille's first release from his new production company, DeMille Pictures Corporation. It was also upcoming actor William Boyd's first starring role. In DeMille's next picture, The Volga Boatman, which was a tremendous success, he cast Boyd as the solo leading man.

Plot
As described in a film magazine review, Malena, a young bride, has a fear of her husband Kenneth which she cannot understand but which he attributes to his unprepossessing physical appearance. Finally, angered, the young husband leaves his wife to go to Chicago and have a physical defect overcome, if this be possible. His wife leaves on the same train. The train is wrecked and the young man rescues his wife from death. Thereafter they understand each other.

Preservation and Availability
Complete prints of The Road to Yesterday are held by: Prints also exist in private collections on 16 mm and 8mm film.
 * Library of Congress (on 35 mm)
 * George Eastman Museum
 * UCLA Film and Television Archive (on 16 mm and 35 mm)
 * Academy Film Archive.

On September 24, 2013, the film was released on DVD by Alpha Video. Another DVD version was released on July 31, 2014, by The Video Cellar.