Directed by Edward Sedgwick • 1928 • United States
Starring Buster Keaton, Marceline Day, Harold Goodwin
Buster Keaton is at the peak of his slapstick powers in THE CAMERAMAN—the first film that the silent-screen legend made after signing with MGM, and his last great masterpiece. The final work over which he maintained creative control, this clever farce is the culmination of an extraordinary, decade-long run that produced some of the most innovative and enduring comedies of all time. Keaton plays a hapless newsreel cameraman desperate to impress both his new employer and his winsome office crush as he zigzags up and down Manhattan hustling for a scoop. Along the way, he goes for a swim (and winds up soaked), becomes embroiled in a Chinatown Tong War, and teams up with a memorable monkey sidekick (the famous Josephine). The marvelously inventive film-within-a-film setup allows Keaton’s imagination to run wild, yielding both sly insights into the travails of moviemaking and an emotional payoff of disarming poignancy.
Directed by Edward Sedgwick • 1928 • United States
Starring Buster Keaton, Marceline Day, Harold Goodwin
Buster Keaton is at the peak of his slapstick powers in THE CAMERAMAN—the first film that the silent-screen legend made after signing with MGM, and his last great masterpiece. The final work ...
This 2004 commentary features Glenn Mitchell, author of “A–Z of Silent Film Comedy.”
Hosted by longtime Buster Keaton friend James Karen, this 2004 documentary by silent-film historian Kevin Brownlow and filmmaker Christopher Bird focuses on Keaton’s time at MGM. In his autobiography, Keaton describes signing with the studio as “the worst mistake of my life.”
This documentary, made in 2020 by Daniel Raim, features interviews with silent-film experts John Bengtson and Marc Wanamaker.
This new interview, shot in 2020, features James L. Neibaur, author of “The Fall of Buster Keaton: His Films for MGM, Educational Pictures, and Columbia.”
In addition to Buster Keaton and Marceline Day, there is a third star of THE CAMERAMAN: Buster’s camera. This thirty-three-minute documentary, produced by ASC cinematographer and film preservationist Karl Malkames in 1979, authoritatively documents the history and development of Keaton’s favorite...
