A Modern Hero is a 1934 American pre-Code romance drama film starring Richard Barthelmess and directed by G. W. Pabst. It is based on the novel with the same title by Louis Bromfield. It was Pabst's only American talking film and the next-to-last film that Barthelmess made under contract to Warner Brothers.

Plot

When a circus comes to Pentland, Illinois, young Joanna Ryan (Jean Muir) is seduced by trick rider Pierre Radier (Richard Barthelmess). Despite his physical skill, Pierre is dissatisfied with circus life and falls in love with Joanna. His mother, the one-armed circus star Madame Azais (Marjorie Rambeau), warns Pierre about falling in love. She tells how she lost her arm to a leopard because she was distracted by her love for Pierre's father, one of the richest men in Europe. She urges Pierre instead to act on his ambitions and desire for wealth. Joanna's drunken father (J. M. Kerrigan) confronts Pierre with news of Joanna's pregnancy, then died in an accident, Pierre offers to marry Joanna, but she wants the familiar stability of small-town life and marries local Elmer Croy (Theodore Newton). Croy knows about her pregnancy. Pierre gives her money for the child's support.