Post 811 - Images from the 1927 "Novelization" of Keaton's "The General"

The "novelization" is pretty dreadful, but some of the images in it aren't in general circulation, to the best of my recollection.  So here they all are - (no copyright, all PD images at this point)

Post 720 - Chatting Among Animators Last Night

And the conversation slipped to humorous matters on February 6:

OK, we got to talking about classic comedians last night at the ASIFA coffee, after musing about "just what isn't funny," and the names Harry Langdon and Pierre Etaix percolated up (and I'm afraid, I was the main instigator).  Langdon has gotten a bum rap in the opinion of yr hmbl typst, perpetuated by Walter Kerr in his otherwise amazing 1970s book, The Silent Clowns.  The lack of access to his films has seemed to support the allegation over the years, but his complete silent output has been made available on DVD, and online.  It proves otherwise.  In fact, I contend he was the silent era's equivalent to Andy Kaufman, because, when left to his own devices, he could be utterly surreal.  It didn't hurt that he was also an accomplished cartoonist.

Pierre Etaix was a writer for the French auteur Jacques Tati (Mon Oncle, Les Vacances de Mssr Hulot, Playtime, Trafic) who was a fierce fan of Keaton and later, of Jerry Lewis (The unfinished Lewis "worst film" of The Day the Clown Cried is floating around in truncated form, but it may have benefited by the addition of Pierre Etaix, if such was a possibility).  Anyway - Etaix's films were self-funded, suffering the fate of those of Tati's - when one of them didn't cover costs, the creditors swept in and took possession of the assets - the films - put up as collateral.  As a result, the Etaix gems, and they truly are gems, were unseen in the US until the last decade.  My widdle head went kerBOOM when I came upon them on Turner Classics, and I immediately ordered the whole set, and then sent Etaix a gushing fan letter - only to have it returned a month later because...he had DIED.  It gave me flashbacks to trying to contact Harold Lloyd as a tween in the early 1970s or Tati as a semi-adult in the 1980s.  Anyway, here are some links to the films associated with this rambling note (thank the coffee, the 20 degrees with 30mph winds outdoors, and a dog not letting me out of her sight until she gets fed for contributing to this extensive bit of typing).  SO - if you're interested, here's a way to kill some time!

Harry Langdon:

Three's a Crowd - 15 minutes in inspired a similar scene in "Seule Tod" by yr hmbl typst - this film has him trying for "pathos" in between moments of nitrate decomposition:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zemRj97rAek

(warning - there is an unfortunate moment of "blackface" amid the ruins of this movie)

The Chaser - 56 minutes into it is the most bizarre "seduction" ever put to film.  This was his final feature for Warner's to be released - they never released his completed feature after this one, and it is now considered among the "lost films."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6EQOuC2n6Q 

If you want to see how a career can be demolished by alcohol, check out the 1935 feature from Columbia, Atlantic Adventure.  He plays a reporter's sidekick, "Snappy," and he is impaired on-screen to a greater degree than Barrymore managed in Grand Hotel. 

On youtube - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SQ3XAm99nD8

And now, for Pierre Etaix:

Rupture - 1961 - the consequences of writing to a girlfriend who is no longer friendly - the sounds were recorded in post-production, often provided by Etaix himself because the studio foley man wanted to stick to stock noises.  It's an otherwise silent one-reeler, deliciously fatalistic.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XxOg4rmhnKM

Happy Anniversary - 1962

Reminiscent of One Week, a young married couple is thwarted in their celebration by the lack of parking.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NsjIbZ_YD7k&t=10s

Yoyo - excerpt - 1965

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WwP8miXVl7I

And the infamous The Day the Clown Cried - a 30 minute assembly of clips, uncovered by David Thrasher during the evening's discussions:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0vF8FKuljU

 

A still from "Three's Company" - the creative sequence using the doll as surrogate for Langdon is hampered by severe nitrate decomposition, but you get the idea...

Post 693 - "The General" Novelization - 1927

Small town libraries don't seem to be the repositories of history any more.  The digital push brushes past tangible artifacts that have slipped from the thin vapor of memory and are no longer deemed significant.

This afternoon I found a volume in the local library's "discard bin."  It may have been remaindered from a local estate sale, it may have been donated and rejected for fund raising purposes.  

The title immediately caught my attention, having recently attended a showing of the Jim Schaub/Ron Pesch documentary, Keaton:Home in Muskegon.  The General is frequently cited among the best silent films ever made, and in terms of comic timing and visual composition, a likely contender as one of the best films ever made in any category.  

I never heard of the author, Joseph Warren, and opened it, expecting to see the exploits of some European count or Great War honcho.  Instead, the cover page told a completely different tale - The General was a contemporary novelization of the 1927 Keaton masterpiece, an expensive epic that, to jazz age eyes, wasn't all that much to get enthused over (the Raymond Griffith film Hands Up! had better reviews), with the dark humor of the battle scenes regarded as positively repelling.   

I'll be scanning the pages in the days ahead to preserve this version of the film, lest my own eventual estate sale be equally incapable of finding the original volume a proper, appreciative custodian.

Thus far, I have only come upon one other novelization by Joseph Warren (of Long Island, according to his prologue to The General): What a Widow! was a novelization of an early Gloria Swanson talkie of the same name in 1930.  Will continue to explore the rabbit hole!

 

(note her producer's name) 

 

Click here for The General (archive.org 4K file - if it takes too long to "fire up" you can just download the file and enjoy it when and where-ever you wish!)