Just perfect...

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

While it doesn't offer any answers, it both thrills and makes you think.

The best films of this genre always show a path and provide a takeaway for being a better person.

In New York, Buster (Keaton) is a public photographer. You can get your picture taken for ten cents. While he is taking a picture, a big parade takes place: many people gather and among them, Sally (Marceline Day) a young woman who works for the News department at the MGM. The crowd is so big that he is pressed against her, smelling her perfume... After the crowd disappears, he offers to take her picture. She agrees but has to go leaving him with her photograph. When he visits her at work, he decides to be a cameraman... Then he will be able to see her anytime! But you do not become a cameraman just like that: you have to learn how to do it. First, it is an expensive job: he has to buy a camera. Even if he gets the cheapest one, he has not got any money left. Then you have to move the handle the right way: this gives a sequence where you can images moving forwards and backwards, an overprinted ship in a street, and a sequence where the picture is multiplied. A very surrealistic movie which does not please the MGM News director. But Sally still encourages him to go on. She even accepts a date with him. But things do not work as expected. Still, she gives him a last chance : go and film the Chinese New Year. You can guess how it will end... This film is Keaton's penultimate movie. The talkies are coming: The Jazz Singer was released by the Warner Bros Company. This is Keaton's swan song. There is much melancholy, and even sadness in this story. Everything falls apart. Anything he tries is a failure. Even when he wants to end it all and go back to tintypes (he sends his last film to the studio) : instead of being mocked, he is hired! Nevertheless, this film contains great scenes: the stairs, the swimming-pool, the Tong war... Moreover, Keaton teaches us a great reporting lesson: he show us how things work behind the scene. He even rearranges the fights during the Tong war (nobody does that...), but still close to the fighters, risking his own life! As I said earlier, it is his swan song. Kea ton will be less and less important in the film industry. And the last sequence has something prophetic in it: the film ends where it started, with a big parade which he thinks has been organized for him! But this was the day Lindbergh was celebrated after he crossed the Atlantic Ocean. His next movie will be Spite Marriage. Sadness and melancholy will be stronger. Meanwhile, let us enjoy this movie as it is: a very fine comedy, one of Keaton's best. So, enjoy!

Rollicking silent-era comedy from Buster Keaton.Simple yet engaging plot. However, its not the main story that matters, but the many detours on the journey. The whole thing is one random, funny adventure.Some moments of pure genius from Keaton. The dime bank scene was one, and the whole swimming pool scene was another.Great work from Keaton in front of the camera. Good support from Marceline Day. However, the show is almost stolen towards the end by Josephine, the monkey...

There's so much creativity in this film. It's amazing to remember that this was made before maybe 99.9% of everything else (movies and TV) I've ever seen. There are stunts I've never seen before and lots of innovative shots and sequences.There's a powerful truth and subtlety to Buster Keaton's performances. It's not fake or forced or exaggerated, he doesn't even seem to be trying for laughs. His character isn't stupid but is often oblivious - he accidentally bumps things, misses details, gets things mixed up. Perhaps he's clumsy because he's so indifferent. He isn't careful because not many things matter much to him and he doesn't get hurt easily. But when he's set on achieving something, he does crazy, impressive, imaginative things and is seems almost unstoppable.Buster executes his stunts and physical comedy perfectly and yet it still all looks natural and accidental as if his character didn't mean it at all. That takes a huge amount of skill. He stays in character the whole time. And then his reaction afterwards is almost always mild. It doesn't need to be more, it's the concept that is hilarious. In spite of his efforts to learn from mistakes and avoid trouble, things always seem to go wrong. We've all had experiences like this so it's funny to see his confusion and frustration as he tries to figure out what's going on.His comedy isn't so much about anticipation as execution. We're not sure what's going to happen in a situation and often it's simpler and more primitive that what we might've guessed. But when it happens, it's always timed so well and looks incredibly graceful and comical. We're amazed and surprised while Buster just shrugs and moves on.The monkey is really cool, he must have been trained pretty well. The way he interacts with Buster is cute and awesome.The Cameraman is also fairly romantic. Buster falls in love and you see it in his eyes and posture. He goes into a daze. It's a simple and innocent thing that happens. The girl becomes all that matters to him and he does many things for her without asking anything in return. He sees her walking away with another man at one point and humbly accepts his fate. He may be the great stone face but he uses his body like few others so his emotional expression is not really limited at all. And of course his eyes express a lot. It's about mastery - he chooses to restrain his facial expressions and gestures but he has great control over what he *does* do, which is what matters.With modern comedies you hope for decent writing and acting and maybe a few big laughs. In a really good comedy, you might even get one or two pretty original moments. With Buster, you get a movie full of original ideas performed by a hard-working perfectionist. Buster's like a gymnast, a veritable comedy ninja.

The Cameraman should have marked the beginning of a long and productive association with MGM for Buster Keaton. In a sense it was the high point of his career. The film came out just as sound was being introduced in the cinema. I've always thought that Keaton's deep sad voice matched his doleful countenance perfectly and sound should have made him just like it did Laurel&Hardy. But it wasn't to be for a variety of reasons.Still The Cameraman is a silent classic that suits Keaton's style perfectly. He's a tintype photographer who after a funny encounter with a bunch of newsreel cameramen decided if he can't beat them, join them. He gets a newsreel camera and tries to show what he can do. Keaton's got a double motive not just the job, but he wants to win the heart of newspaper secretary, Marceline Day.The rest of the film is a succession of gags with the camera, and poor Buster's efforts to take pictures in some perilous circumstances. He also acquires an organ grinder's monkey after first thinking he killed him. The monkey proves to be a valuable pet. Funniest sequence is when he's sent to cover the Chinese New Year celebration and two rival tongs start a war on the spot.In these days where now photographs are taken from hand held cellphones, younger viewers might not get some of the problems with the bulkiness of those old movie cameras. Keaton has some hilarious moments dealing with the contraption.For baseball fans, there are shots of old Yankee Stadium where Keaton comes to photograph the game and finds the Yankees are in St. Louis playing the Browns. I wasn't sure that it wasn't a set at first until I saw the old Jerome Avenue IRT passing during a shot as Keaton does an impromptu baseball routine before the groundskeepers throw him out. This was Yankee Stadium the year after Babe Ruth set his record of 60 home-runs.Charles Lindbergh via some newsreel footage makes a guest appearance here during the finale. Talk about dying of thirst at a reservoir, that's about what happens to Keaton. You'll have to see the film to find out what I mean.A lot of the ideas that were used in MGM's famous screwball comedy of the Thirties, Too Hard To Handle with Clark Gable, Myrna Loy, and Walter Pidgeon can be found in The Cameraman. It's a comedy classic from Buster Keaton and regretfully one of his last.