Entries associated with the tag "Buster Keaton":

Because of space limitations, our print edition can't accommodate as many Critic's Choice boxes for older films as it once did. So welcome to "What's Old," a new weekly post in which I'll try to showcase the week's best revival. This week it's the Buster Keaton comedy Our Hospitality (1923), which screens tonight as part of the Silent Film Society of Chicago's annual summer festival, with live organ accompaniment by Michael Jacklin.

Our Hospitality was Keaton's first genuine feature (The Three Ages, released earlier that year, was really just three shorts slapped together), and it climaxes in one of his most hair-raising stunts, a daring rescue at the edge of a waterfall. It was also Keaton's first exercise in Americana, which would flower in two of his greatest movies, The General (1927) and Steamboat Bill, Jr. (1928).

The screening takes place tonight at 8 PM at the Portage Theater, 4050 N. Milwaukee; tickets are $12. Here's a nice little clip from the film, decked out with a tune by Daft Punk.

The Silent Film Society of Chicago begins its summer festival tonight with the Harold Lloyd comedy Speedy (1928), which screens at 8 PM at the Portage Theater, 4050 N. Milwaukee, with live organ accompaniment by Dennis Scott. Programs are every Friday night through the third week of August, and as usual the schedule is a combination of the usual suspects (Buster Keaton in Our Hospitality on August 1, Fritz Lang's Metropolis on August 8) and lesser known titles for the buffs (Children of Divorce with Clara Bow and Gary Cooper on July 25, Raoul Walsh's Sadie Thompson with Gloria Swanson on August 15). The festival wraps up on August 22 with a program of five shorts (Keaton in One Week, Lloyd in Somewhere in Turkey, Harry Langdon in Lucky Stars, W.C. Fields in Pool Sharks, and Douglas Fairbanks in The Mystery of the Leaping Fish). 

The only clip from Speedy I could find on YouTube is this homemade video for "1945," a tune from Neutral Milk Hotel's classic 1998 album In the Aeroplane Over the Sea. It doesn't begin to do the Lloyd movie justice, but the song is great, so why not give it a spin?