Saturday, February 01, 2014

Looking at Buster Keaton


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I am reading the Kindle book FUNNY by David Misch.  It is an in- depth book studying the styles of many comedians and funny people, like Woody Allen, Steve Martin, and so on.  It tells their format or style.  Some of them have it down to a mathematical science.

Buster Keaton, a comedian of the silent movies is mentioned and referred to a lot.  I knew he did a movie about THE LOCOMOTIVE CHASE, which started near here in Kennesaw.  About the only other  thing I knew about Keaton is that he never smiled.  However, I learned that he finally smiled in one of his last movies when he kissed a French model.  I learned that he did all his own stunts and was famous for it, some death defying; I learned that he was the producer and director of most his movies and had artistic control, and that is why he didn't want any closeups of his escapades - to not to show him grimacing with pain from his stunts;  I decided to look him up on Youtube and see all this myself.   Above  is a good random look of his style.  I noticed his body language for silent movies is excellent.  He was a great artist.

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