The General (1927)

Keaton went to great lengths to make his film as authentic as possible. His stunts are real and really dangerous. He made great efforts to have trains that looked as if they were from the Civil War and to clothe his extras in period costumes. In this regard he perhaps tried a little too hard. The southern soldiers look just a little too tidy. They all seem to have the same hats and they all seem to have shoes. This does not quite fit in with the history of the period. It does not matter however, for Keaton was not making a history film. There are critics who emphasize the historical accuracy of The General, but this emphasis can go too far. Keaton is not suggesting that we believe that the actual historical event, that his film is based on, happened this way. His film is a comic version of the events not a representation of the events themselves. It is thus that he can successfully find laughter in the most tragic conflict of American history.

The print on the Kino DVD is very good. Most importantly it is shown at the correct speed. I have seen a video version of The General which ran 107 minutes, but it did not include any more material than this DVD. Rather it was shown at the wrong speed, so that everything ran slowly. This was disastrous for Keaton's films depend on speed, for his comedy depends on his quickness of thought and action. The print on the Kino DVD is furthermore, well tinted mainly in sepia with night scenes appearing blue/grey.

The music which is played during the film is on the whole fine. It is mainly a selection of tunes from the Civil War period. The only time I found the music questionable was when `The Teddy Bears Picnic' accompanies Buster's meeting with a bear. The childlike imagery it evokes is quite wrong.

This DVD is good value for it also includes two of Keaton's best short films. The Playhouse is very funny, but is also noteworthy for being technically ingenious. Cops is another chase film, but in the end is more pessimistic than The General. It includes the famous image of Buster's hat on a gravestone which, in way, sums up his whole comic career.

Film #1 is "The General", a Civil War tale involving trains, one of Keaton's obvious real life obsessions. "The General" was filmed in 1926 in the town of Cottage Grove, Oregon. He stars as the engineer of a train who tries to join the Southern Army but is rejected as being too important to the southern cause as an engineer to be sacrificed as an infantryman. Keaton helps out anyway and is chased throughout the film by the mean Yankees. There's a scene where the engine of one of the trains collapses a bridge and tumbles into the river, which happens to be the most expensive scene filmed in the entire silent film era, and it's kind of thrilling. Keaton took great pains in making sure that authenticity of the Civil War era (1861-65) was shown throughout the film, but I wish he didn't dress the Confederates in matching uniforms, like their counterparts, the Yankees. With the limited resource material he had at the time, it is understandable; however, the reality was that matching uniforms in the Confederacy was rare, for reasons too long and detailed to go into here.

Film #2 is "The Playhouse" (1921). Although this isn't as fun as the Keaton shorts that involve his being chased around Los Angeles, I found it unique and interesting. In one scene, Keaton falls asleep and dreams that he is every person inside a live theater, from the spectators (women, too), the actors - including a monkey!, the guys in the orchestra pit, and backstage help. It was hilarious to see him take every part in a minstrel show, a softshoe act (my favorite), and he had the monkey act down perfectly. Just from seeing how Keaton imitates the precise details of the various acts shows us that he absorbed A LOT from watching the other performers when he toured in vaudeville his first 20 years of life.

Film #3 is "Cops". This is one of Keaton's all-time classics. Keaton is swindled out of a wad of money by a con man who sells him some poor family's junky-looking furniture, who think Keaton was hired to be their mover. When a bomb is thrown at a policemen's parade and ends up on Keaton's wagon full of furniture, Keaton uses it to light his cigarette and then tosses it out, landing in the parade and exploding. This, of course, causes a million cops to chase Keaton through the streets. We get to see a lot of 1922 Los Angeles in this film, and sometimes you may find yourself getting too distracted at looking at the interesting streets instead of him. If you're interested in seeing more 1920's L.A. in Keaton's films, try "Sherlock Jr." and "The Goat".