Wednesday, June 10, 2015

"The General" (1926)

A Buster Keaton movie.  Confederates are the protagonist and Union the antagonists in this story line, but otherwise, movie isn't political.  It's an adventure action comedy, with a romantic twist threaded through it.  Mildly slapstick/physical humor, of course, since it is a silent movie.  Absolutely delightful movie.  Grins and smiles throughout this movie where I found me sitting on the edge of my seat without the stress of a supercharged suspense movie.

Trying to decide of Buster Keaton was a short man.  This movie made it look so.  The movie definitely highlighted the strength and agility needed by train engineers--or abilities had and used by Buster Keaton--or both.  "A Crash Course on How to Run a Steam Engine in 1861" certainly crossed my mind, but the character Johnnie Gray didn't need the crash course; he already knew.  Still, the various adventures along the way opened up to me details I hadn't pieced all the way together--things that were matter-of-fact, day to day things then.  Interesting.

No comments:

Post a Comment