BUSTER KEATON DBLE FEAT.:GENER

Details

• Release Year: 1928
• Genre: Adventure, Comedy, Romance, War
• Plot: Often listed among the ten best films of all time, THE GENERAL is Keaton's greatest work, at once a full-scale epic, a wonderful comedy and an authentic-looking period drama. Buster plays Johnnie Grey, a locomotive engineer in the Confederate South whose two loves are his girl, Annabelle, and his engine, the General. When Northern commandoes kidnap Annabelle and hijack the General, running it North to cut telegraph lines, destroy track and burn bridges behind them, Johnnie gives chase in another locomotive, the Texas. The second half of the film is a brilliant mirror image of the first: Keaton rescues Annabelle, recaptures the General and is chased South by the Northern commandoes in the Texas until the climax - the most expensive scene in all silent cinema - when an actual locomotive drops through a burning bridge into a river.; ; STEAMBOAT BILL, JR. is another film that assures Keaton a place as one of the geniuses of world cinema. Buster plays Willie Canfield, an effete college student who returns to Mississippi to help his tough, crusty dad, Steamboat Bill (Ernest Torrence), run the family steamboat (an old tub). But Junior has two strikes against winning his father's approval: he's not macho, and his girlfriend (Marion Byron) is the daughter of Bill's hated business rival. The climax, a cyclone, contains one of cinema's greatest moments: the two-ton front of a building collapses on top of Buster, but thanks to an open window passing over him, he remains standing and unhurt.; ; These masterpieces of fun from comedy's greatest era gain fresh life in sparkling prints with scintillating music and sound provided by The Alloy Orchestra. 'These Boston-based musicians have rejuvenated the art of silent film with thrillingly quirky, percussive scores.' (Entertainment Weekly, 'The 100 Most Creative People in Entertainment,' June 25, 1999)
• Cast: Marion Mack, Glen Cavender, Jim Farley, Frederick Vroom, Charles Henry Smith, Frank Barnes, Joe Keaton, Mike Donlin, Tom Nawn, Buster Keaton, Henry Baird, Joe Bricher, Jimmy Bryant, Sergeant Bukowski, Capt. C.C. Cruson, Jack Dempster, Keith Fennell, Budd Fine, Eddie Foster, Ronald Gilstrap, Frank Hagney, Ray Hanford, Jackie Hanlon, Al Hanson, Anthony Harvey, Edward Hearn, Boris Karloff, Hilliard Karr, Elgin Lessley, Louis Lewyn, Jackie Lowe, Billy Lynn, Ross McCutcheon, Tom Moran, Charles Phillips, Red Rial, Al St. John, Harold Terry, Ray Thomas, Red Thompson, James Walsh, John Wilson, Jean Woodward
• Director: Buster Keaton
• Runtime: 2:26
• Company: Image Entertainment, Blackhawk Films
• Media Format: Movie