• The General, 3/17/23 (Fri)
• Sherlock Jr., 3/18/23 (Sat)
• Steamboat Bill, Jr., 3/20/23 (Mon)

Criterion was offering a Keaton collection for the month, so I decided it was a good chance finally to see what I’d been missing. I chose three representative films as a starter. All were technical wonders. The General (1926) is the most ambitious in terms of sheer scale. Keaton is a Confederate engineer at the outbreak of the Civil War. He has tried enlisting, mainly to impress his girlfriend, but is depressed to have been rejected, not realizing that the enlisters simply thought him too valuable as an engineer. His girlfriend, thinking he’s a coward, refuses to have anything to do with him until she sees him in uniform. Meanwhile, his train, the General, is hijacked by Union soldiers, who intend to drive it North and cut all bridges and communications in order to pave the way for an attack. Keaton, determined to retrieve his train, pursues them frantically in various creative ways. He ends up pretty much by accident in the office of the Union leaders, where he overhears their elaborate plot – and on top of that discovers that they have kidnapped his girl. When the coast is clear, he grabs her and steals the General back, prompting an all-out alert by the Union side to stop him. He thus goes from pursuer to pursued, and the jaw-dropping ensuing chase has to be seen to be believed.

Keaton apparently did his own stunts, which must have had the studio in permanent panic mode (he actually broke his neck at one point but went right on filming). I can’t even imagine the split-second timing and preparation needed for some of these moves – including collapsing bridges, near misses, speeding trains, a real train plunging off a bridge, and much more. This is said to be one of the most expensive silent films ever made, and it shows. That said, every scene and stunt is organically linked to the story, which reaches a satisfying conclusion. (It is based on an actual incident that was also filmed later by Disney in a long-forgotten effort.)

The endless flow of visual jokes would not be possible in a sound film, which would involve an extra dose of reality that would throw the proceedings off balance, such as the scene when Keaton is chopping wood on top of the speeding train without realizing that huge mobs of soldiers are retreating (or was it advancing?) behind him. I was in awe. The few lines in the film, rendered on dialogue cards, are actually quite funny. A terrific film.

The earlier Sherlock Jr. (1924) is more ambitious in terms of story. A man is wrongly blamed for stealing a watch from his girlfriend’s father after being framed by a rival in love. Falling asleep in his job as a movie theater projectionist, he dreams that he walks into the movie screen à la Purple Rose of Cairo and takes on the role of a detective who helps solve a similar crime of stolen property. The movie-in-the-movie involves an elaborate but unsuccessful scheme by the villains to kill the detective (including an explosive eight ball featured in an amazing billiards game), followed by a breathtaking chase scene where Sherlock is riding on the handlebars of a motorcycle oblivious to the fact that the driver had fallen off partway through (an idea duplicated in part in The General). In the end, he saves the day and gets the girl. When he wakes up in the projection booth, he learns from his girlfriend that the real-world crime has been solved and that he has been found innocent. She apologizes, and he amusingly tries to muster up the courage to kiss him by slyly following the lead of the lovers on the screen.

The film packs an incredible amount of pratfalls, chases, bold special effects, and humor both high and low within its brief 45 minutes. But it also takes time to establish the characters and situation in a satisfying way. Memorable scenes in a film full of them include his trailing the real-life villain in close coordination, the point where he leaves his body and enters the movie screen, the astounding chase, and the cute final sequence where Keaton turns to the movie for hints as to how to woo the girl. I remembering wondering when I saw the Woody Allen film why no one had thought of that idea before, and now I see where it came from. The technical effects were highly accomplished, but even more impressive was the dizzying variety of stunts and physical humor, all intricately timed and executed.

Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928) was the most ambitious of the films in terms of character, helped by the over-the-top presence of Ernest Torrence as Bill Sr., giving Keaton someone meaty to play against. A brawny steamboat operator is appalled to discover that the son he hasn’t seen in years turns out to be an effete beret-wearing college boy. The father wants to shape the boy up to help him with the steamboat, which is being threatened by a new rival steamboat owned by the town’s leading banker and hotelier. As it happens, the steamboat operator’s boy is in love with the banker’s daughter, a match opposed intensely by both sides. Needless to say, everything works out in the end, but only after a series of hair-raising challenges.

The movie is not as tight as the others story-wise but offers the best set of characters in the contrast between the giant (190+cm) father and the diminutive (165cm) Keaton, whose shifting relationship gives the drama real heart. I love the jailhouse scene when the father initially rejects his son, who has baked bread for him, only to turn quickly when he realizes that the “bread” contains tools for a breakout. Torrence is as hammy as they come, but that works perfectly in this context with the stoic Keaton.

(Two un-PC moments: Keaton runs up to a man who he thinks may be his father, only to discover that the guy is black. In another case, he emerges from the ocean and scares a black kid to death in what may be considered offensive. I thought it was funny.)

The film’s highlight is the tremendous cyclone scene, where objects, trees and entire homes are tossed around and destroyed like paper. It leaves no storm possibility unturned: Keaton just avoids the collapse of a building, unknowingly misses a flying object, clings to a tree that is uprooted and flies through the air, and on and on, not to mention the iconic scene where the entire wall of a home falls onto him as he stands just in the spot where the window frame is located. (That was reportedly an actual wall of several tons, meaning Keaton was risking his life for the laugh.) The resulting cost of the film and its lackluster critical and commercial reception at the time (also true of The General) led Keaton to sign an unwise contract with a large studio that stripped him of his independence and effectively ended his career; he called it the worst decision of his life. But at least he went out on a high point.

While Sherlock is probably the best all-around experience of the three films because of its inventive story, all are exhilarating and tremendous fun. Highly recommended.