|
Hot Picks
| |
|
Free and Easy
Easy Go / Buster rutscht ins Filmland
USA 1930
produced by
Buster Keaton, Edward Sedgwick for MGM
directed by Edward Sedgwick
starring Buster Keaton, Anita Page, Trixie Friganza, Robert Montgomery, Fred Niblo, Edgar Dearing, Gwen Lee, John Miljan, Lionel Barrymore, William Haines, William Collier sr, Dorothy Sebastian, Karl Dane, David Burton, Jack Baxley, Edward Brophy, Richard Carle, Louise Carver, Jackie Coogan, Cecil B. DeMille, Drew Demorest, Ann Dvorak, Joseph Farnham, Pat Harmon, Lottice Howell, Arthur Lange, Theodore Lorch, Billy May, Doris McMahon
scenario by Richard Schayer, adaptation by Paul Dickey, dialogue by Al Boasberg, songs by Fred E. Ahlert, Roy Turk
review by
Mike Haberfelner
|
|
|
 |
Available on DVD! To buy, click on link(s) below and help keep this site afloat (commissions earned) |
|
Always make sure of DVD-compatibility!!!
|
|
|
 |
|
Small town beauty queen Elvira (Anita Page) is going to Hollywood to
become a moviestar, accompanied by her mother (Trixie Friganza) and her
manager Elmer (Buster Keaton), who was appointed to her by the local
chamber of commerce but who's also madly in love with her. Elvira's
actually fond of Elmer, if more than anything as a friend, but her mother
detests him. Even on the trainride to Hollywood, when separated from
Elmer, Elvira meets moviestar Larry (Robert Montgomery), who falls in love
with her at first sight and invites her to MGM filmstudios to ... well,
mostly sit around. Elmer makes many an attempt to catch up with Elvira on
the studio lot but is chased from set after set by the gate guard, ruining
many a film shoot in the process. Eventually, and rather unwittingly, he
becomes Larry's driver though, but when Larry tries to force himself onto
Elvira, Elmer brings in Elvira's mom for backup and the two of them
prevent the worst ... but still, mom thinks Elmer is bad for Elvira. Only
after Elmer's timely intervention does Larry realize what he has done, and
he becomes friends with Larry and promises him his break ... and suddenly,
Elmer's the star of a musical comedy, with of all people Elvira's mom as
his on-screen partner. Now that he has found the success that Elvira has
actually been hoping for, he finds the courage to propose to her ... but
in such a hypothetical way that she thinks it's and apology plus proposal
from Larry, and once Elmer has shot his last scene and wants to propose to
her for real, she's already engaged to Larry ... Free and
Easy is the first feature length talkie with slapstic genius Buster
Keaton in the lead - and it shows that with the advent of sound, Hollywood
(read MGM) has
totally lost understanding of Keaton's kind of comedy. Oh it's not that
Keaton has problems with dialogue, and even his singing comes across as
rather pleasant, the problem is ... the whole thing just doesn't feel like
a Buster Keaton film. Now sure, early sound cameras were extremely bulky
things, so any big camera movements were out of the question (including
the big shenanigans that made many of his silent masterpieces), but
most of Keaton's slapstick scenes feel so disappointingly mediocre,
sloppily construced, and following rather tired patterns. Now add to this
a cookiecutter story that's not tailored to Keaton's talents, that suffers
from structural problems, tired buildup and two-dimensional characters,
and you're left with rather little already. True, the film comes alive a
little with the musical finale, where Keaton proves, totally against his
type, rather effective as singer and dancer (still with a comical spin of
course), but that's too little too late.
|
amazon.co.uk
amazon.de
eThaiCD.com
find Free and Easy at adultvideouniverse.com
