The General (1926)
Steamboat Bill Jr. (1928)

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Product Description

Studio: Image Entertainment Release Date: 10/21/2003 Run time: 144 minutes Rating: Nr

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Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #86920 in DVD
• Brand: Image Entertainment
• Released on: 2003-10-21
• Rating: Unrated
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Black & White, DVD, Full Screen, Silent, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Dubbed in: Japanese
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 146 minutes

Amazon.com
Buster Keaton's career reached its creative apex with the rousing comic adventure The General. Not merely one of the finest silent films, this remains one of the great film comedies of all time. The Great Stone Face stars as Southern railroad engineer Johnny Gray, a man with only two loves: the sweet Annabelle Lee (Marion Mack) and his trustworthy engine, the eponymous General. When Fort Sumner is fired upon he's one of the first to enlist, but when the war office rejects him (he's too valuable as a trained engineer) his sweetie rejects him as a coward. Johnny has the opportunity to prove his bravery when Yankee spies steal his engine and inadvertently kidnap Annabelle, and Johnny pursues with all the resources at his disposal: handcar, bicycle, and finally railroad engine. Keaton's love/hate relationship with technology and machinery shines as he becomes one with his beloved locomotive and wrestles with a finicky cannon that threatens to blow his engine off the tracks; with tremendous dexterity, he nails the humor with inimitably deadpan takes. Spunky Marion Mack makes a perfect partner for Keaton, not merely a foil but a gifted comedienne in her own right. Other Keaton films contain more laughs and inspired comic stunts, but none combines romance, adventure, and comedy into a solid story as seamlessly as this silent masterpiece. --Sean Axmaker

In Steamboat Bill Jr., Keaton stars in the story of a college-educated young man who comes home to help his father work on his Mississippi River steamboat and immediately demonstrates just what a landlubber he is. What's worse, the woman he falls for is the daughter of his father's worst rival, a bullying rich guy who wants to drive Buster's boat out of business. Keaton's slapstick is inspired and precise, particularly during an amazing sequence in which he tries to walk across town during a tornado. Watch in amazement as the front of a building falls on Keaton and he walks away without a scratch. --Marshall Fine

From the Back Cover
Often listed among the ten best films of all time, The General is Buster 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. Steamboat Bill, Jr. also assures Keaton a place as one of the geniuses of world cinema as he plays Willie Canfield, an effete college student who returns to Mississippi to help his tough, crusty dad Steamboat Bill 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 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)

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Customer Reviews

Two Reasons to Love America
The two funniest and most visually artful movies ever made! Some of my amazon friends have expressed concern over my lack of gung ho patriotism and regard for home-grown all-American products. Well, y'all, I say without reservation that the silent-era comedies are America's answer to the Parthenon, the Sistine Chapel, and the Mercedes Benz 300SL, and Buster Keaton is our Shakespeare, Goethe, and Ibsen all in one.

Steamboat Bill is a classic wimpy-son-overcomes-macho-dad story, with fantastic physical humor and a storm scene made with propellor fans that's more effective than anything done with computer graphics.

The General is a miracle of cinematography - the best chase scenes ever, the best realization on film of the Civil War period - and a total hoot besides. Buster plays a Rebel engineer who steals a locomotive and gets chased by half the Yankee army; oddly enough, the script is based on a real event of train-theft and sabotage, but the clever saboteur was a Yankee and the pursuers Secessionists. I guess Buster was a Copperhead, a northerner with southern sympathies, but I'll forgive him.

Sweden has Bergman, Italy has Fellini, Japan has Kurosawa, but America has Buster Keaton! Happy Fourth of July!

Great Films, Great Quality DVD.
I had seen The General twice before purchasing this DVD, and acquiring it was my main goal for this purchase. I had not seen Steamboat Bill, so this 2 in 1 DVD seemed like the best buy.

Overall, I was not disappointed. The images are extremely sharp and clean for movies of this vintage. They almost look brand new, save for some inevitable, but minor artifacts of age. The General is tinted monochrome. Mostly sepia, with some blue tinted night scenes, a common effect in silent films. Steamboat Bill is straight black and white.

Many people are not aware that The General is based on a true story about a locomotive stolen during the Civil War (see: http://ngeorgia.com/people/thegeneral.html), and that the real locomotive now resides in a museum in Kennesaw, GA. The Keaton film is one long exciting chase scene. The first time I saw it, I was actually a little disappointed. It really isn't a comedy, like most of Keaton's films. Rather it is an action movie with sight gags. Once I understood that, I really appreciated the genius of the film, and it is now one of my all-time favorites. It was filmed on location near Cottage Grove, Oregon.

Steamboat Bill Jr. is pure fun. It ranks among the best of Keaton's works, I think. Its the story of the son of a steamboat captain, who falls in love with the daughter of a rival boat operator. The climactic storm scene boasts a number of special effects that rival, or even surpass, today's computer generated effects for believeability. There is also one really hokey, but funny effect involving a flying tree.

My favorite scene in Steamboat Bill was in a hat shop, where there is an inside joke that will be understood only by those who have seen more of Keaton's work.

I would give this DVD five stars instead of four, except that I have mixed feelings about the Alloy Orchestra soundtrack. Their percussive style was very effective in The General with its rapid-fire chase scenes and mechanical locomotive movements. On this film I give them an A. However, they were far less impressive on Steamboat Bill. Here, the music often felt intrusive and distracting, drawing attention away from the action to the orchestra itself. Moreover, a couple of times the style of the music failed to match the mood of the scene. On this movie I give the orchestra a C-. I would really like to see some DVD's with a "Mighty Wurlitzer" theater organ soundtrack to mimic the performance one might have experienced in most theaters of the 1920s. Orchestral accompaniment was quite rare in the silent era, except in the largest big city theaters.

The Keaton DVD you've been waiting for....
Well, at least it's the one I was waiting for. "The General" is one of my all-time favorite movies, and "Steamboat Bill" is my second most favorite Keaton movie. I've seen the Kino DVDs of both films, and I was blown away by the quality of Film Preservation Associates' restoration. Just astonishing--they look like they were filmed last week.

If there was one weak point of those DVDs, it was the music. For example, the music for "General" was basically a series of Civil War tunes. Not bad by any means, but unremarkable. The music didn't add or subtract from either movie.

That all changes with THIS new DVD edition! The Alloy Orchestra (which is actually just three people) composed and performed brand new scores for both films, in high fidelity stereo (of course). The difference is astounding. Thanks to the new scores, both movies have a new energy and immediacy, and I find this edition to be far more entertaining than the original Kino releases. And, since the versions of the films on this DVD are the same FPA restored versions on the Kino releases, I'd have to say this is the DVD that Buster Keaton fans should DEFINITELY own, even if they already own the first Kino releases.

But don't just take my word for it. If you can, rent this DVD, compare it to the original Kino release, and judge for yourself. See if you're as impressed as this Keaton fan was.