Buster Keaton, der Student

While not one of Buster Keaton's very best films, this one has some enjoyable sequences and some good comedy material.

The plot is fairly simple, with Buster as a bookish college student who feels that he must succeed at athletics in order to win the girl he wants. It doesn't have the brilliant creativity of Keaton at his best, but on the other hand it does have some very funny moments.

Some of the best parts are the misadventures of Buster's character as he tries his hand at various sports. Even in portraying a character who is athletically inept, Buster demonstrates his own great ability at physical comedy. There are some fine gags in these scenes, and there is some good subtle material in the other parts of the movie.

For those who are not familiar with Keaton, there are several better examples of what he could do. But if you enjoy his brand of humor, you'll certainly want to see "College" too. It's more low-key than usual, but it has plenty of good material that makes it worth watching.

Here Keaton plays Ronald the bookworm. He graduates from high school, apparently the valedictorian, and gives a graduation speech on the evils of athletics. The girl he loves - Mary - tells him she won't consider him as a suitor unless he changes his attitude. Ronald enters Clayton College where his endeavors in a number of sports - and jobs - are rich with gags. The villain of the picture is played by Harold Goodwin, who was actually a lifetime friend of Keaton's.

"College" is no doubt one of Keaton's weaker features. It was made right after his pride and joy, "The General", failed miserably at the box office. Thus, Keaton wasn't really in the mood to exert himself either physically or creatively in his next picture. The irony in this film is, of course, that Keaton was a superb athlete and even acrobat. He was good enough at baseball that many feel he could have played professionally, so the scene where he messes up the baseball game for Clayton College is particularly ironic.

COLLEGE (United Artists, 1927), directed by James W. Horne, is something of a sort-after silent classic inspired by Harold Lloyd's more successful college comedy, THE FRESHMAN (1925), starring Buster Keaton demonstrating on how to fail as an athlete without really trying.

The story opens one rainy afternoon with Ronald (Buster Keaton), carrying his umbrella, walking along side with his mother (Florence Turner) to attend his high school graduation ceremony along with his other classmates: Mary Haines (Anne Cornwall), the girl he loves, and Jeff Brown (Harold Goodwin), his rival for Mary's affection and star athlete who is finally graduating after seven years. Ronald, the school's "most brilliant scholar," receives his diploma, and is asked by the members of the faculty to speak on the "Curse of Athletics," which he does. After degrading sports by saying "The student who wastes his time on athletics rather than study, shows ignorance" and "Where would I be without my books," wins approval with the teachers but not with his classmates, especially Mary, who finds his speech ridiculous. Because Ronald loves Mary, he finds he might now really lose her to Jeff (Harold Goodwin). As Mary and Jeff register at Clayton College, Ronald decides to enroll there also, and with no financial support from his mother, he decides to work his way through college where he intends to win back Mary's affection by becoming an athlete himself.

In true Keaton fashion, he tries out in all sports imaginable, ranging from baseball, track and field events, shot-put and finally as a coxswain on a varsity crew team in an important race, and flunks. Even while working as a soda jerk and as a waiter, he fails at that, too. But after he learns that his girl is in trouble does he pull out all stops in making himself a success without realizing how good he actually is.

COLLEGE may not be as well known as Buster Keaton's other silent film comedies, including two of which come to mind, SHERLOCK Jr. (1924) and, of course his masterpiece, THE GENERAL (1926), but it's a simple-minded story set against a college backdrop that features plenty of sight gags and sports activity to make this one enjoyable, especially to any avid sports fan.

The supporting players include: Snitz Edwards as the college dean; Grant Withers, Sam Crawford, Buddy Mason and Flora Bramley. While these names are not particularly well-known, it's the Buster Keaton name heading the cast that has generated interest in this comedy, then and now.

COLLEGE was one of the twelve selected films to appear during the summer months on public television's 1975 weekly presentation of "The Silent Years" as hosted by Lillian Gish, with a piano score and color tints from the Paul Killiam collection. Before the airing of the feature-length silent comedy, Gish would talk a little about Keaton's career and how he became known as "Buster,", present a 20-minute comedy short, ONE WEEK (1920), and then ask for the viewers awaiting to see COLLEGE to not be offended with one particular scene where Keaton's character of Harold is working in a restaurant disguised as a "colored" waiter. This plea would still reflect upon viewers of today.

COLLEGE, which is available on video cassette and DVD, can be seen in various ways, depending on the distributor, especially with its time length. Blackhawk Video's version accompanied with the same piano score that was used in "The Silent Years," runs at 60 minutes; while Video Yesteryear's accu-speed version with organ score runs close to 100 minutes. A more recent and recommended (1992) restored version with clearer picture and a fine new organ score by John Muri, running at 65 minutes, was the one formerly shown on cable television's American Movie Classics (1997-2001), and later on Silent Sunday Nights on Turner Classic Movies.

In spite of a handful of college-sports films produced during this period, it's interesting to point out that such legends of screen comedy as Charlie Chaplin and/or WC Fields have never attempted this. Future film comedians as Lou Costello and Jerry Lewis have done such, and probably were inspired by the likes of Lloyd or Keaton. However, COLLEGE is minor but enjoyable Keaton at best that would be a fine addition to any film buff's video or DVD library. (***)

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"In films that combined comedy with extraordinary physical risks, Buster Keaton played a brave spirit who took the universe on its own terms, and gave no quarter" (Roger Ebert)

Among many silent movies which we are lucky to see these days (and which have not been lost after all), COLLEGE by James W. Horne and Buster Keaton was a real surprise for the audiences in my town's movie theater. Seeing silent comedies on the big screen exceptionally proves to be an uncommon experience. I think that there are hardly any viewers who may leave the cinema disappointed. Simply because the humor of COLLEGE seems to have stood a test of time combining comedy features with some notions of what a good movie entertainment is all about. What is it about?

It is to amuse us, to bring relief, to educate a bit being at the same time not too tense. Roger Ebert, in the quotations that marks the beginning of my review, nicely observes that Keaton was able to execute tremendous physical abilities, which makes his films interesting even today. That is particularly noticeable in COLLEGE and calls our attention throughout. His character of young Ronald who does anything to make himself attractive to Mary (Anne Cornwall), the girl he loves, executes much of timeless humor. Combined with wit, the effect is outstanding: awe and laughter go in pairs and substitute each other. Who can forget the hilarious scenes on the sports field? How can you remain indifferent to his efforts? A lot of such moments when he moves like a true athlete do not allow you to concentrate elsewhere. That makes COLLEGE vibrant and surprising.

Keaton's character is quite different than Charlie Chaplin's roles. He is quite a flamboyant young man who makes us laugh but ALSO makes us identify with his dilemma. Just to note what there is at the heart of his efforts: to win the heart of his 'sweetheart.' Consider the scenes with his mother (Florence Turner) when the humor is somehow directed towards his umbrella but also supplied with a clue of such a young man's personality, his dealing with the world and his dealing with simple situations. When he is in the arms of his Mary at last (the moment that he reaches thanks to extraordinary pains taken), it is a truly genuine moment, a moment of a dream fulfilled...expressed in the face of a performer.

Among the supporting cast, Snitz Edwards is fabulously funny as the Dean, the old bachelor who only claims to be indifferent to a woman's love.

To draw a humorous conclusion, COLLEGE is a light hearted entertainment which, though it is silent, does not let you resort to silence. Having seen it, you still feel a desire to share your thoughts with other people. A gem of its time!

Purists like to dismiss Buster Keaton's ninth feature as an atypical and thus somehow unworthy commercial compromise forced by the relative failure of his previous masterpiece 'The General'. But while it may not have the deeper resonance of other Keaton comedies it certainly isn't lacking for laughs. The scenario itself is common enough, presenting a variation of Harold Lloyd's popular college comedy 'The Freshman', featuring Buster as an Ivy League bookworm attempting athletic competition to impress a disinterested girlfriend. But the bits of comedy in between the plot lines are unique and many, making this a film of details, some of them quite startling: Buster, carrying a tray of soup, doing a backward somersault without spilling a drop, or trying his hand at every possible track and field event with predictably embarrassing but inventive results, or adding a hilariously cold-blooded epilogue to the happily-ever-after fadeout. No matter how familiar it might appear in outline, the world inhabited by Keaton was all his own, and always contained surprises enough to delight the unwary, inattentive viewer.