The General (1998)

fine early motion picture--and one of the best ever made !!!
The General is clearly one of the greatest silent films ever made; and one of the better films of all time to boot! The action is never ending which held my attention very well; and the acting is quite convincing. The plot moves along at a good pace and the quality of the print is very good.

The action starts down south when Fort Sumter is fired upon by Union troops; this means the start of the Civil War. Johnnie Gray (Buster Keaton) tries to enlist--and he even makes it first to the enlisting office. However, Johnnie is turn down; they feel he would be more valuable to the South as an engineer although he is not told this. Johnnie's second attempt to enlist fails, too. Worse yet, Johnnie's sweetheart Annabelle Lee (Marion Mack) is convinced that Johnnie is lying to her and that he didn't even try to enlist. Annabelle, thinking Johnnie is too afraid to fight, tells Johnnie that until she sees him in uniform she's not even speaking to him.

Of course, this sets up the REAL treat of the movie, which is an extended and extensive train chase scene that lasts a long while but never gets boring. Johnnie Grey's train, The General, is stolen by Union troops and he takes another train to get even with them and recover his prized locomotive. Of course, this generates several memorable scenes with Johnny trying to literally derail the Union hijacked train (The General) and the Union troops trying to bump off Johnny and proceed with a surprise attack on Confederate troops.

The plot gets an interesting complication when Annabelle is captured by the Union troops and is taken prisoner on board The General; and we are left in suspense as to how she will be freed.

The plot, of course, still can take many avenues from here. Will Johnny--or anyone--be able to rescue Annabelle and get back The General? What happens when Johnny has to cross enemy lines to fight to get back his train--and his girl? How will Johnnie ever elude the Union soldiers when he is hiding under the table in their home after being caught out in the woods for too long? No spoilers here, folks--watch the movie and find out!

The choreography works so well in all the crowd scenes as well as the chase scenes; and the cinematography gives us excellent shots of a huge bridge on fire and a train descending into the river after attempting to cross that burning bridge. Great!

Overall, if anyone tells you to skip this movie, ignore them. It's simply excellent. Buster Keaton, Marion Mack and all the others turn in fine performances that must have made them proud. No wonder this was Keaton's favorite movie of all that he made!

A smart and still-funny silent Keaton comedy
I picked this up at the recommendation of my son who is taking a film studies class. "The General" is a Buster Keaton silent classic that still has plenty of good hearted laughs 80 years after it was made.

"The General" is the tale of sad-faced Johnnie Gray, of Marietta, Georgia, the engineer on his beloved "The General" in Civil War years. When hostilities begin, Johnnie is in peril of losing his sweetheart, Anabelle Lee, unless he joins the army. Alas, the army does not want Johnny. But a nearby battle promises salvation. Johnnie finds himself of a complicated plot involving stolen trains, switched uniforms, spies, overheard plans and a kidnapped young lady. It's not a big surprise, this being a comedy, that things will turn out well, but I'll leave the details for your own viewing of this masterpiece.

The comedy involves an enormous amount of physicality on Keaton's part. He scampers like a squirrel over and into his train's cars, straddles cow catcher of his moving train to clear obstacles from the rack, falls down cliffs, hides under tables and endures downpours. The stunts all seem done without doubles and without safety equipment, which adds to the poignancy of the action. It's amazing that Keaton didn't get killed or hurt while making the film.

"The General" is a piece of its time. There's a certain amount of misogyny in the film, played for laughs. The dainty Anabelle, trying to help Johnnie stoke his train's engine finds a piece of wood with a hole in it. Assuming that anything with a hole is no good, she tosses it over the side. The plot, which involves brave Southerners fending off buffoonish Northerners, is a bit reminiscent of that other early film classic, "Birth of a Nation." But perhaps it is just funnier to lampoon Union generals than poke fun at the side that lost the war. In any event, "The General" makes clear that watching important people fall down or get soaked with water never loses it comedic value.

The only bad thing about this edition of "The General " is the music, which had absolutely nothing to with the action. Someone evidently strung together a number of available (perhaps public domain) pieces -- "Pomp and Circumstance, "bits from "The 1812 Overture" and everything but the kitchen sink -- and called it a soundtrack. That's a pretty cheap way to get a movie distributed, but "The General" would have benefited from more inspired accompaniment. Unfortunately, it helps to watch the movie with some sound, however horrid, rather than none.

"The General" is hardly a must-see movie, but if you want to appreciate film's early stars and innovators, and maybe watch how stars communicated without sound, it's hardly time wasted.

Thank you Buster Keaton.
I have had the VHS version of The General with Buster Keaton for some time. A couple of weeks ago I sat my 12 year old grandson on the couch with me to watch it. At first this young, jaded, Xbox live addict gave the big HO-HUM sigh and consented to watch. He was already in trouble for something else and had been severely told by his mom to behave, so we began to watch "The General".

As the movie progressed, I tried chatting with him and telling him some things I knew about the movie-notice the long film shots with little cut-away, lack of wires, Keaton actually doing the things we see him doing without the safety tools we have today, that the view through the cigar hole in the table cloth was the first time in film that sort of shot had been done. He began asking questions about ¼ hour into it. He was soon engrossed and his troubles vapored away. I wound up having a wonderful evening with my grandson. His mother picked up a happier boy.

One thing I don't think many people know is that we owe to Buster Keaton much of the comedy of Lucille Ball. Later in his life, he mentored Lucy, teaching her what he knew of comedy and continuing to give us laughter even when he was no longer the performer.

Thank you Buster Keaton. Thank you for The General, for Lucy and for that evening with my grandson.