A man who believes that love is more animal and chemical than spiritual, bets that by controlling the circumstances, he can get any man and woman to fall for with each other and get engaged within a month.
Old sailor Chris Christofferson eagerly awaits the arrival of his grown daughter Anna, whom he sent at five years old to live with relatives in Minnesota. He has not seen her since, but believes her to be a decent and respectably employed young woman. When Anna arrives, however, it is clear that she has lived a hard life in the dregs of society, and that much of spirit has been extinguished. She falls in love with a young sailor rescued at sea by her father, but dreads to reveal to him the truth of her past. Both father and young man are deluded about her background, yet Anna cannot quite bring herself to allow them to remain deluded.
During a raid, a cop lets a pretty speakeasy employee escape and later begins dating her. Although she loves him, his salary and dull life leave her wanting.
Bill Whipple is a happy-go-lucky mechanic for MacDonald who thinks that he is the worlds greatest driver and lover. Mac has treated Bill like a son since he took him in. One day at the track, Bill sees Pat Bannon, and tries his best to impress her, but to no avail. On his way to catch a flight, he tricks Pat into taking him to the airport and she gets even by taking him up in a plane. He hates to fly, but will not show her that he is afraid and when the plane breaks up, he is a hero for rescuing her. This gets him publicity and Renny offers him his car to drive in the Indianapolis 500. Bill breaks with Mac to drive the car and puts it on the pole for the race. Then Renny double crosses Bill and plans to drive the car himself since Bill has tuned it so well.
The vaudeville act of Harriet and Queenie Mahoney comes to Broadway, where their friend Eddie Kerns needs them for his number in one of Francis Zanfield's shows. When Eddie meets Queenie, he soon falls in love with her—but she is already being courted by Jock Warriner, a member of New York high society. Queenie eventually recognizes that, to Jock, she is nothing more than a toy, and that Eddie is in love with her.
Lulu is a young woman so beautiful and alluring that few can resist her siren charms. The men drawn into her web include respectable newspaper publisher Dr. Ludwig Schön, his musical producer son Alwa, circus performer Rodrigo Quast, and seedy old Schigolch. When Lulu's charms inevitably lead to tragedy, the downward spiral encompasses them all.
Tasia (Dolores del Río), a beautiful dancer lower class of Russia, falls heir to the throne Prince, Grand Duke Eugene (Charles Farrell), but only admired from a distance. At the outbreak of the Russian Revolution, the Duke falls in captivity and this allows Tasia be near him.
Forced by her mean-spirited father, Lord Chief Justice James O'Brien, to marry a man she doesn't love, Connaught O'Brien gives up hope of ever with her true love, Dermot McDermot. After her father dies and a hunted rebel leader returns to town, however, Connaught finds a renewed hope that the tides of oppression will shift and she might again find happiness. This silent romantic drama, set in Ireland, is the first film in which a then-unknown John Wayne is clearly visible.
So This is Love? was another early Frank Capra production for fledgling Columbia Pictures. The hero, dress designer Jerry McGuire (William Collier Jr.), is tired of being considered a wimp. After business hours, Jerry secretly takes boxing lessons, enabling him to knock the stuffings out of his burly rival Spike Mullins (Johnnie Walker). Jerry's newfound pugilistic skills wins him the affections of store clerk Hilda Jensen (Shirley Mason), who's just car-razy about "cave men." Filmed in a fast three weeks, So This is Love? was completed before Frank Capra's Matinee Idol but released afterward. Leading lady Shirley Mason was the sister of Viola Dana, who starred in Capra's initial Columbia effort, That Certain Thing.