Buster Keaton

I have only seen "Sherlock, Jr." but I love that work. Slapstick done amazingly and the stunts are remarkable considering the time and what they included (the whole train segment, for instance).
 
Later in his career he did a film about travelling the trans Canada Railway, it was fun. He popped up in some of the Beach Blanket movies and also "It's a Mad , Mad, Mad, Mad World" in the sixties.
 
Thanks for that SM. I will seek out more of Keaton's work.

That opening shot of him on the train blows me away. His self-awareness of both himself and the medium he was working in is incredible.

There is so much going on in those few seconds that it really hits the level of art for me even down to the way he cocks his head at the end of it.

I really feel like a dunce for not noticing more of the silent film era and the standouts.
 
Keaton for me did his best work with Fatty Arbuckle,unfortunately very little of that work is around on celluloid.
 
Keaton had a small role in Sunset Boulevard in which he uses his deadpan expression to great effect. In looking that up, I found this 1949 clip (with Judy Garland and Van Johnson) that he wrote and directed.

 
Keaton had a small role in Sunset Boulevard in which he uses his deadpan expression to great effect. In looking that up, I found this 1949 clip (with Judy Garland and Van Johnson) that he wrote and directed.

Re Sunset Boulevard, iirc, Keaton was a member of the "waxworks" card party at Norma Desmond's house.
 
Re Sunset Boulevard, iirc, Keaton was a member of the "waxworks" card party at Norma Desmond's house.

The backstory on Sunset Boulevard is amazing. Swanson basically called out the whole industry as to how they discarded and forgot actors then moved on. A great film.
 
If they decided to make a Keaton biopic, this actor would be a good choice to play the lead. With a little make-up, he at least would look the part.

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I really did not appreciate his genius until I watched this short piece. What an amazing performer -


Great analysis. The deep-focus photography - lost for a time when sound was added - also is striking. I suspect it helped Keaton's humor greatly (i.e., it permitted more movement within the frame than was possible in the 1930s). I read many years ago this was because of the noisy but effective lighting that was used in silent films but which could not be used when sound first was introduced. (It ended around the time of Citizen Kane .) I noticed this recently when watching a comedy movie from the 1930s. All of the action was on the same plane, essentially the same distance (left and right) from the camera.
 
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