Written and Directed by Buster Keaton and Clyde Bruckman
In 1926 Buster Keaton had full control of his films. He has the power and success to do anything he wanted, and he chose to adapt the story of “The Great Locomotive Chase”. During the Civil War, a band of undercover Union soldiers and men kidnapped a train out of Georgia called The General. They planned to disrupt communication lines and blow up bridges along the way to trap the Confederate army in Union land without supplies. They were followed by the train’s conductor, who refused to have his train stolen out from under him. Eventually the hijackers were caught. Some were put to death. These Union men were the first in history to receive the Medal of Honor, under President Lincoln.
Keaton’s film differs from the true story, using it as a launching point. We do find the Union soldiers hijacking The General with a plan to cut off lines. However Keaton, playing fictional engineer Johnnie Gray, turns the pursuit into an edge of your seat affair that perfectly highlights his artistry as a gymnast and comedian. The energy maintained by one lively feat after another has, in my opinion, been matched only by ‘Raiders of the Lost Ark’ in the pantheon of great cinema. This is a man who goes after his train in the same way that a father just “wants his kids back” in a bad Hollywood kidnapping thriller. Though the film is technically categorized as “slapstick”, I would say that the gags aren’t about hitting one another or stupidity, which I commonly associate with the genre. Smartly conceived and executed, this is a “physical comedy”. Part of the brilliance of the film also lies in the communication of subtle emotion. Even though it is a silent film, you’re there with every moment, laughing because your brain fills in the gaps of the unspoken words. Jokes that would be done today with a rambling grasping at straws explanation make you laugh in the same way if you just see the person going through those motions. At times, this is even an advantage the film has.
Apparently there was a letter writing campaign by Civil War veterans who considered a Hollywood comedy about the Great Locomotive Chase to be in poor taste. As a result, Keaton didn’t end up getting the original General for his production (it’s amazing to imagine a time when there was a possibility of a filmmaker having access to the original ‘props’ anyway). One can be certain that the original train The Texas wasn’t used. In what was at the time the single most expensive shot in the entirety of cinema, Keaton and Clyde Bruckman staged an entire train falling from a burning bridge into a river, while soldiers crossed the water. No miniatures, no tricks, this was actual footage of them torching the bridge and crashing The Texas. Especially by today’s standards, where special effects are done completely in a computer, the shot is impressive.
As with most of the great films in cinema, The General was considered a complete disaster upon initial release. In 1989, twenty-three years after Keaton’s death, The General became part of the United States National Film Registry, a preserved gem of national cinema. It is a testament to the power and durability of this film, which continues to inspire and encourage laughter after all these years. Recently, Kino Video released a digitally remastered Blu-ray disc of The General. The film looks fantastic for its age and though it won’t shine like a modern film in High Definition, when you take into account the condition the original print must have been in, it’s a remarkable sight. It is clear and clean and if one was to compare it to previous DVD releases, there is no contest. At the time of this writing it is the oldest film to have made the transition to HD.
***** Five Stars – Don’t Miss This Film
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