The General (1926)
A Southern railroad engineer, turned down by the army and dumped by his girl, gets both back when Union spies steal his locomotive with her aboard. He gives chase in a second engine, alone, across enemy lines and back. Keaton plays it deadpan while staging real trains, real bridges and a genuine locomotive plunging into a river.
A flop in 1926, now near the top of most greatest-films lists. The gags are engineering: everything you see actually happened in front of the camera.
Background
Buster Keaton co-directed The General with Clyde Bruckman. It is based on the Great Locomotive Chase of 1862, when Union raiders stole a train in Georgia. Keaton insisted on authenticity, and filming took place in Oregon on a real railway, with real engines. The scene in which a locomotive falls through a burning bridge was reportedly the most expensive single shot of the silent era.
What to watch for
The film did poorly at first, and critics found it too serious, but it has since been recognised as a masterpiece; it was among the first films chosen for the National Film Registry in 1989. What is remarkable is how the comedy grows out of the action: Keaton’s character is never a clown, but a determined man whose problems keep getting bigger. Look at the shot in which he sits on the connecting rod of a moving locomotive, and at the pursuit in the second half. The film’s period detail is a delight.
