The Playhouse

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Nick M @RT62896014 Jan 8, 2025 It felt like this should have been funnier, but I just didn't find it so. It was more situational amusing, but it relied too much on the old formulas in the end to feel like a modern (for the time) comedy. I enjoyed Keaton pretending to be a chimp, so there's that. There are lots of clever camera tricks, but none of these are original, and I didn't find much particularly engaging. See more Jul 24, 2015 Buster Keaton brings us a catalogue of camera tricks and visual quips in this classic 1921 short. Keaton's innovative camera shutters pioneered popular shot techniques and many of his great sight gags are still regularly replicated on the silver screen today. A majestic reminder of the magic-show quality of early moving pictures. See more Sep 29, 2014 The opening dream sequence in which Keaton plays every role - famously including some multiple exposure shots where he played up to nine parts - is a stupendous technical achievement which happens to be very entertaining as well. After the six minute dream sequence, the entertainment is less consistently premium Keaton but there are still plenty of good stunts and great bits in the rest of the movie. A theme of doubles, mirrors, and reflections continues through the movie along with as lots of vaudeville comedy. See more Feb 9, 2014 The Buster Keaton show... literally. So this is about a stagehand (Keaton) who works at a theatre where things have the tendency to go wrong. After a nap filled with surreal dreaming, he's got a show to run. I wouldn't go so far to call this my favorite Keaton short, because that honor goes to the One Week, but this might just be my runner-up; I really do like it that much. As you may have already picked up in these reviews, I am very admittedly a massive Buster Keaton fan. For being made in 1921, this has some pretty spectacular special effects. For the opening six minutes, it's nothing but Keaton on the screen, playing every single part. There are as many as nine Buster Keatons showcased at the same time. One small point against this is that there is a brief instance of blackface in this, and while it makes you cringe, he doesn't do anything overly offensive, except for the make-up itself. His physicality is, like always, really is the sell point; there is a scene where he is playing a monkey, and he really gets into it. Seriously, it is something that probably inspired Andy Serkis for the Planet of the Apes series and King Kong, and I absolutely mean that. I am so thankful that shorts were a much more popular of a medium back in the day, just because there are so many opportunities for me to see Keaton in something that I have never seen him in before. See more Jan 28, 2013 This is quite disjointed towards the end but features a brilliant opening sequence, where Buster Keaton plays every role at a time when such technical wizardry would have been remarkable. See more Jul 30, 2012 This may only be a 22 minute short film, but there's certainly a lot going on. What we get are the goings on at a playhouse, seeing various skits and stage performances, but this film isn't so simple, as it jumps all over the place from dream sequences to reality and back, and is all kinds of disjointed, but the real highlight is the fact that the cast is made up of dozens, with 75% (at least) of them being Keaton in multiple roles. That's pretty cool and impressive, but even more so given the technical limitations of the day, and the fact that Keaton was able to pull this off, especially a sequence where he appears in frame as 9 different characters simultaneously. And people think Eddie Murphy is great at this sort of thing. This seemed mroe overtly funny than The General, but maybe because it's shorter and there's more laughs crammed in per minute. I'm still not a big fan of slapstick, but this makes me appreciate it a bit more. That, and, like I said, this has some crazy innovations going on. Even then, it's not the most memorable thing ever, but still cool. See more Read all reviews

The Playhouse

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