![]() ![]() The movie is filled to the brim with jokes and gags that have since been used in many movies and cartoons. Escalators run at full speed, propelling people like slingshots and toy trains that bring around food get derailed. The entire set is created to serve the purpose of jokes. The comedy amplifies when an actual engineer tries to ruin the electric house and everything goes haywire. So the automation depicted in this film was very far-fetched in its day but seems quite normal to us. It is essential to remember that at the time, electricity was in its nascent stage. The Electric House (1922)Īnother example of the futuristic vision of Buster Keaton, ‘The Electric House’ follows a botanist mistaken for an electrical engineer who is commissioned by a wealthy man to make an automated house. It showcases Buster Keaton’s spirit to break the mould and innovate. But the montage uses many techniques such as dissolves, reversed footage and double exposure that are staples in modern movies. He makes a montage of unorthodox films and gets ridiculed. ![]() He is insulted by officials and other cameramen but he perseveres to make videos. It follows Buster as a photographer who trades his tintype camera for a movie camera just to be close to a girl who works at MGM studios. The studio made all directors and producers watch and learn from it to make great movies. This is such a great comedy that MGM studios used it for many years as an example of the perfect comedy. Every frame of this masterpiece is astonishingly well made and executed with brilliance like none other to achieve comedy. The remaining portion of the film uses effects to make identical twins of the girl Buster is pursuing. It is marvellous to see what was achieved in the early days of cinema. The first quarter of the short film has multiple characters in the same frame, all played by Keaton himself. The entire film is hinges on multiplicity and the confusion that occurs because of it. And ‘The Play House’ is a testament to his achievement in visual effects. The Play House (1921)īuster Keaton has been instrumental in pioneering visual effects that were just as complex as those we see today but he did it nearly a century ago. This is another staple of Keaton’s movies in which he and Arbuckle play opposing characters with a similar goal. Arbuckle tries his own escape rendering all the guards unconscious in his attempt. When in prison he meets another inmate played by Keaton’s close friend and regular collaborator, Roscoe ‘Fatty’ Arbuckle. It uses many different devices that have been reused in so many movies and TV shows. He ends up being dressed as an escaped prisoner and the rest of the film explores him trying to escape again through innovative schemes. ![]() Like a lot of Keaton’s films, it starts with a bumbling Buster Keaton trying to woo a girl, this time during a game of golf. An example of his influence in modern comedy can be seen in how he uses a boxing glove at the end of a tie rack to build an extending arm that has been reused in Tom & Jerry and other comedies. It makes for a brilliant ride in the regular Buster Keaton fashion. But he ends up disturbing a police parade in a crazy chain of events and hence gets persuaded by hundreds of cops. He steals some money in a slapstick moment to try to make it big. It shows Buster playing himself as a man whose love tells him to become successful before he asks for her hand in marriage. Like most of his other works, ‘Cops’ is also a short film. ![]()
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