Comments on Screen Savour: The Navigator (1924)

Thanks, R.D. and John, for your great comments. It...

2009-08-15T11:44:13.423-04:00

Thanks, R.D. and John, for your great comments. It's amazing how similar people are when it comes to Keaton's works — which I think speaks highly of his talent as a filmmaker. Truth be told, I'm not sure he ever made a solid dud during the silent era, a feat that Chaplin also managed to pull off (although A Woman of Paris, a very un-Chaplinesque feature, doesn't work). It's tough when it comes to something like The Navigator because I don't find it to be a masterpiece, but I do find it to be a great film. The difference feels negligent in the abstract, but the feeling is there. It's no wonder Roger Ebert inducted "The Films of Buster Keaton" into his great movies collection after The General. The director simply had a lot of great films with only a few degrees between each one.

P.S. I'm with you, John. I wish I could pick up that Kino set, but unfortunately it's not in the budget. Amazingly, I don't own any Keaton (public domain has made most of his work available online, though the quality is inferior); I'm definitely putting Sherlock Jr. on my holiday shopping list, though!

T.S. I have not seen this film in many years and ...

2009-08-14T07:53:49.681-04:00

T.S. I have not seen this film in many years and my recollection of it is that it just falls short of his greatest films, which for me are Sherlock Jr. and The General. In terms of greatness, I would say Our Hospitality, Steamboat Bill Jr. and The Navigator follow closely. For me, of these last three it is splitting hairs saying which is a better film. They are all master works each containing enough artistry to rightfully classify them as brilliant. These five are, again for me, Keaton’s greatest feature films. All are treasures to watch repeatedly. Your series here makes me want to go out and buy the Kino box set which I have been neglecting to purchase for so long and watch these classics.

T.S., I have to agree with your assessment of &quo...

2009-08-14T03:17:37.138-04:00

T.S., I have to agree with your assessment of "The Navigator." It has its fair amount of inventiveness and originality, but I think other of Keaton's better known films surpass it in overall quality. It's a subdued film. Although it has many clever gags, it doesn't have any of those extended jaw-dropping, knockout sequences that really stick with you afterward. The character Keaton plays doesn't seem ideally suited to his image either. It's more like the bratty, spoiled, immature young men Harold Lloyd sometimes played. Interestingly, in the 1972 Sight and Sound poll of directors and critics for the best films ever, this was picked as #1 by Penelope Gilliatt, who I believe at the time shared movie critic duties with Pauline Kael at the New Yorker. For the record, I gave it 3 stars out of 4.

No feathers ruffled here, I can assure you. I know...

2009-08-14T00:17:56.189-04:00

No feathers ruffled here, I can assure you. I know many hold the film in slightly higher regard than I do, although to be fair, it does earn a 4.5-star rating in my book, which is still pretty damn good. It's a great film regardless. No doubt it's among the essentials of cinema, even if it's not (I must insist) "perfect."

This brings up something important for me, however. It is a film like The Navigator that has prompted me to begin assembling a "personal canon" list that will appear soon on the right-hand side of my blog. My five-star club is a bit difficult to get into, and it was designed as such so that five stars could mean and be worth all five. But I'd still count 4.5-star films as pure essentials that should be treasured by all as well. So this "personal canon" project will encompass my five-star/4.5-star/selected 4-star films and give real credit to my favorite films.

Thanks for stopping by, as always!

All due respect to your most valued and informed p...

2009-08-13T22:18:29.180-04:00

All due respect to your most valued and informed position T.S., but I must agree with Kerr. Thi sis a "perfect" film, actually one of three by Keaton (the others of course are THE GENERAL and SHERLOCK JR.) I respect the 'distancing' and 'mechanical disclaimers in an otherwise highly favorable appraisal, but IU can't say I share them.

Another magnificent essay in this seminal series.