Buster Keaton, der Matrose

While it might not be one of Keaton's very best movies, "The Navigator" is a good comedy that has some great scenes. It never quite hits high gear the way that some of Buster's masterpieces do, but there is a good variety of material, and it is pleasant and funny to watch.

Keaton and Kathryn McGuire work together well, and their scenes together make up most of the movie, including some of the funniest parts. Their scenes in the ship's kitchen are especially good. The well-known scene of Buster going deep-sea diving is also very entertaining, and must have taken some real skill to film at the time.

This is one that any fan of Keaton or of silent comedy should enjoy.

The scene where Buster and his girl, two rich youngsters who are stuck together alone on a ship, attempt to feed themselves is one of the funniest scenes I've ever watched. For about 10 minutes, I could not stop laughing. After that scene, the comedy is, well, I was going to say hit and miss, but that's not right. No joke really misses. It's just the difference between a smile, a chuckle, and a guffaw. I would say that, especially compared to my two favorite Keaton films, Our Hospitality and Sherlock Junior, The Navigator is considerably less funny (though almost anything is considerably less funny than those two films). Plus, the film never reaches a solid conclusion. A situation was set up at the film's start which was never advanced at all. Still, The Navigator beats out most modern comedies. Nothing can really beat Buster Keaton. I would give it a 7/10 if it lacked the food sequence, but I'll add 1 point for that, so a total of 8/10.

Through a series of mishaps, a pampered rich boy (Buster Keaton) and his unrequited love find themselves the only two passengers on a huge steamer adrift in the middle of the ocean. Wouldn't be so bad, if they did not come across an island of cannibal savages who want to invite them to..ahem...dinner.

"The Navigator" breezes by quickly and easily, offering many chuckles and few outright chortles. There are some marvelous set pieces, like an underwater scene involving Keaton in diving gear, some swordfish, and an octopus. And there are other smaller but just as funny moments, like the scene where these two socialites who've never lifted a finger for themselves decide to cook dinner in a kitchen designed to make meals for hundreds. The depiction of the island savages is predictably cringe worthy in a film from 1924, but you just have to suck it up and get past it, accepting it as a product of its time. If you can get past that, there's much to enjoy here.

Grade: A-

This story of a helpless, spoiled rich boy set adrift upon a giant ship with his equally helpless girlfriend has a clever story line and a series of excellent gags, but the plot is slow to develop. It is held up by some slow-moving scenes which are not as funny as they try to be. Although the sequence of events which result in the stranding of the couple upon the sea are highly improbable, they were well-executed and the humorous possibilities to be explored make that easy to overlook. Most of the attempted humor pays off, but somehow the movie drags a bit. I especially found the underwater scene to be too long and was an anchor to the movie's momentum. However, it did lead to some very humorous moments when Keaton made it ashore. Keaton's trip back to the ship from the island may have inspired the scene in Woody Allen's Sleeper in which Allen and Diane Keaton escaped from the futuristic police by using an inflatable suit to float across a lake. Whatever one's opinion of the bulk of The Navigator, the ending is unquestionably inspired. This is a great example of Keaton pulling a rabbit out of a hat to the surprise of the audience. It's a great audience pleaser. I would not recommend this movie as an introduction to Buster Keaton, but if you're already a fan, then you have to see it.

Of all the Buster Keaton films I have seen it is certainly not the best, but it is also not the worst. The story of a spoiled man (Rollo) who falls head over heels in love with a helpless woman (Betsy) seems as if it would be easy to hit the audience with punch line after punch line, but the jokes come out at such a sloth worthy pace that it is painstakingly obvious what will happen next. There are some scenes that made me laugh so hard my sides began to ache, but others barely warranted a smirk. It did show off Keaton's incredible nac for physical comedy. The circumstances leading to getting on the ship, the bad coffee, and the experiences after he is off, all show why he was ahead of his time in the movie industry.