Tol'able David is a 1921 American silent film based on the 1917 Joseph Hergesheimer short story of the same name.

[5][6][7] David Kinemon, youngest son of West Virginia tenant farmers, longs to be treated like a man by his family and neighbors, especially Esther Hatburn, the pretty girl who lives with her grandfather on a nearby farm.

Later, the cousins kill David's pet dog and cripple his older brother while the latter is delivering mail and taking passengers to town in his Hackney carriage.

Out of a sense of honor, David's father intends to visit vigilante justice on the Hatburns' cousins rather than rely on the local sheriff, but is prevented by an abrupt and fatal heart attack.

Director King had been born and raised not far away in rural western Virginia and took immense pleasure in scouting locations in preparation for the film.

[10] In Life, Robert E. Sherwood wrote "It is the first motion picture to achieve real greatness without placing any reliance on spectacular effect.

The cinematography "delivered countless views of country life as a version of heaven", while '"the fight is grand, prolonged, and not one to bet on".

He finds its influence "in just about every [subsequent] film where revenge has rectitude" — mentioning, especially, High Noon and Straw Dogs.