Buster Keaton in "The Navigator"
I’m kind of busy this morning. I’m getting a group of work ready to be delivered to a couple of my distant galleries so I’m hustling around, finishing the details and things that should have been finished some time ago on a few pieces.
But I did want to comment on another of my favorites, the great comedic film actor, Buster Keaton. They showed his 1924 classic, The Navigator, late last night on TCM. Like many of Keaton’s films, one of the main characters in the movie was the main prop in the film, a hulking old steamship that is abandoned and adrift. Keaton could make incredible use of his prowess as a physical comedian with the physical dimensions of such a ship, as he had done in other films with locomotives and falling houses, among other things.
With his deadpan, melancholic face and ability to find comedy in very a physical manner, his humor is universal and timeless. I find myself laughing out loud at his work often and marveling at the his daring in performing all the tremendously dangerous stunts that he did without a double. For what it’s worth, Jackie Chan mentions him as one of his biggest influences.
Here’s a short with several of his bigger stunts from several of his films including a funny underwater bit from The Navigator…
Redtree Times 