TSPDT - Buster Keaton

Buster Keaton

Survey of Filmmakers: Top 25 Directors (2005 poll by The Film Journal)

Geoff Andrew's 5 Best Directors

►501 Movie Directors: A Comprehensive Guide to the Greatest Filmmakers

See Also

Woody Allen

Clyde Bruckman

Charles Chaplin

Eddie Cline

James W. Horne

Chuck Jones

Aki Kaurismäki

H.C. Potter

Edward Sedgwick

Mack Sennett

Jacques Tati

Robert Zemeckis

Director / Actor / Screenwriter / Editor / Producer

1895 - 1966

Born October 4, Piqua, Kansas, USA

Key Production Country: USA

Key Genres: Comedy, Slapstick, Short Film, Romantic Comedy, Adventure Comedy

Key Collaborators: Joseph M. Schenck (Producer), Elgin Lessley (Cinematographer), Clyde Bruckman (Screenwriter/Director), Fred Gabourie (Production Designer), Eddie Cline (Director/Screenwriter/Leading Player), Jean C. Havez (Screenwriter), Joseph A. Mitchell (Screenwriter), Joe Roberts (Leading Player), Byron Houck (Cinematographer), Bert Haines (Cinematographer)

Highly Recommended: Our Hospitality (1923) [co-directed by John Blystone*], The Navigator (1924) [co-directed by Donald Crisp*], Sherlock Jr. (1924), Seven Chances (1925), The General (1926) [co-directed by Clyde Bruckman*], The Cameraman (1928) [directed by Edward Sedgwick*

Recommended: Neighbors (1920) [co-directed by Eddie Cline*], One Week (1920) [co-directed by Eddie Cline*], The Boat (1921) [co-directed by Eddie Cline*], Cops (1922) [co-directed by Eddie Cline*], Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928) [directed by Charles F. Reisner*], Spite Marriage (1929) [directed by Edward Sedgwick*]

Links: [ IMDB ] [ TCMDB ] [ All-Movie Guide ] [ Senses of Cinema: Great Directors ] [ Film Reference ] [ The International Buster Keaton Society ] [ The Beauty of Buster ] [ Juha's Buster Keaton Page ] [ Generally Buster ] [ PBS American Masters ] [ The Buster Keaton Museum ]

Books: [ Buster Keaton: Interviews (Conversations with Filmmakers Series) ] [ Buster Keaton Remembered ] [ Buster Keaton: The Man Who Wouldn't Lie Down ] [ My Wonderful World of Slapstick ] [ Buster Keaton: Tempest in a Flat Hat ] [ Silent Echoes: Discovering Early Hollywood Through the Films of Buster Keaton ] [ The Theater and Cinema of Buster Keaton ] [ The Look of Buster Keaton ] [ The Complete Films of Buster Keaton ] [ Buster Keaton ] [ Buster Keaton: Cut to the Chase ]

DVD's: [ Amazon ]

1,000 Greatest Films: Our Hospitality (1923) [co-directed by John Blystone*], The Navigator (1924) [co-directed by Donald Crisp*], Sherlock Jr. (1924), Seven Chances (1925), The General (1927) [co-directed by Clyde Bruckman*], The Cameraman (1928) [directed by Edward Sedgwick*], Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928) [directed by Charles F. Reisner*]

* It is widely accepted that, despite not receiving screen credit, Buster Keaton co-directed these movies or at the very least was still the driving artistic voice.


	"Buster Keaton is the only creator-star of American silent comedies who equals Chaplin as one of the artistic giants of the cinema. He is perhaps the only silent clown whose reputation is far higher today than it was in the 1920s, when he made his greatest films. In comparison to Chaplin, Keaton's films were more blithely athletic and optimistic, more committed to audacious physical stunts and cinema tricks, far less interested in exploring moral paradoxes and emotional resonances." - Gerald Mast (The St. James Film Directors Encyclopedia, 1998)

	"Joseph Francis Keaton is arguably the greatest film comedian the world has ever known. What is perhaps less commonly recognised is that he was also one of cinema's greatest directors: unlike most comics, he displayed a masterly, apparently intuitive grasp of the possibilities of film, both before and behind the camera." - Geoff Andrew (The Film Handbook, 1989)

	"Keaton strikes a chord with the world of post-1960 that was not heard when his greatest films were made. It has been argued, with justice, that his films are "beautiful," which means that their comedy is expressed in photography that is creative, witty, and excited by the appearance of things. That sounds obvious, but most comedy films of the silent era did little more than film the comedian's "act." - David Thomson (The New Biographical Dictionary of Film, 2002)

	"Although his directorial career was cut short by sound and Louis B. Mayer, Keaton helmed, wrote, and starred in some of the most brilliant comedies in cinema history. He had a fine sense of story values, the past, character development, and comic logic. In addition to having talent for slapstick, Keaton, most of all, was a master of humor which could only be done on the movie screen." - William R. Meyer (The Film Buff's Catalog, 1978)

	"I don't act, anyway. The stuff is all injected as we go along. My pictures are made without script or written directions of any kind." - Buster Keaton