Die Werkstatt

The last Arbuckle/Keaton collaboration is one of their best. Stripped of romantic interest and Al St John, all we have here is Roscoe and Buster doing what they do best - having fun for everyone else's enjoyment. Working the dual jobs of mechanics and firemen the boys keep the laughs coming thick and fast. Most of the jokes work and some are positively inspired. The scene where Buster dresses as Sir Harry Lauder still has me laughing. There's also the first appearance of a piece of action where a trouserless Buster is dodging a policeman aided by Roscoe. This gag resurfaced years later when Buster appeared in The Twilight Zone. It's a shame they didn't make a few more films as Buster and Roscoe were well into their stride at this point and understood each other perfectly.

Keaton and Arbuckle's final collaboration is also their finest. With Fatty soon moving on to feature-lengths and Buster continuing as a solo act, the prolific duo came together one last time to entertain audiences (and themselves) in a typically short, simple silent comedy.

They're a pair of mechanics this time, serving double-duty in a combination garage / firehouse, and incapable of finishing one job without creating two or three new ones. The various props and occasions of a busy day in the auto repair business provide ample opportunity for clever laughs, which Arbuckle and Keaton casually pluck like fresh fruit from an overburdened apple tree. It's jam-packed with smart, funny, groundbreaking material; twenty-odd minutes of nonstop escalation. A posh suitor, interested in dating the boss's daughter, sees his neat white suit (and thoughtful flower bouquet) summarily ruined by the bumbling duo, who happen to be working with motor oil nearby. Wobbly vehicles are rented out with no chance of leaving the yard. An enormous turntable, once used to wash and inspect cars, becomes a high-speed human dry-cleaning station and, soon enough, a treadmill.

There's so much rich, creative energy jammed into this small package, it's hard to believe the masterminds behind it were about to split apart. In time, that divorce would work to Keaton's benefit. Arbuckle, sadly, wasn't quite so fortunate.

Keaton and Arbuckle have come a long way since "The Butcher." It's wonderful to see how well they work together in this one.

Leave it to Buster to go *up* the firehouse pole routinely!

There is indeed a lot of "The Blacksmith" (1922) in this one; maybe that, as well as "Cops" (1922), were both Keaton's homage to Arbuckle during his legal trials (which began in late 1921).

Also, now I finally understand the bathtub scene with Sybil Seely in "One Week," which came out in September 1920 ("The Garage" came out at the beginning of that year). The cheesecake seemed out of place in "One Week," but I see now that Keaton was duplicating the scene with Molly Malone here in "The Garage." He did it so well, I had to look both shorts up to make sure different actresses played them.

"One Week" was the first short that Keaton made on his own, and perhaps that explains why "The Garage" is the last Keaton-Arbuckle collaboration.

Also, I used to think Seeley was the most athletic of the Keaton female co-stars, but Malone is even better here.

The scene with Buster running on that spinning disc is also done, in a very different setting, in "The Haunted House," a Keaton short that came out a little over a year after "The Garage."

This Arbuckle/Keaton short comedy has a lot of good material and is quite enjoyable. It's all done in Arbuckle's free-wheeling style, so the story is held together less by the plot than by its setting and by the antics of the two stars.

The setting in "The Garage", where Arbuckle's and Buster's characters work both as mechanics and as firemen, lends itself to all kinds of humor, and the various props and situations are used to good effect. The first part gets lots of mileage out of the cars, tools, and various gadgets in the garage, and later there is an amusingly chaotic fire-fighting scene. There are quite a variety of good gags, with even a billboard getting in on the act.

Although there isn't really a story to speak of, there are lots of frantic goings-on and some great comic moments, making it well worth seeing for any fan of these two great silent screen comedians. In the classic series of comedies that paired the two, this is one of the best ones.

Buster Keaton and Fatty Arbuckle team up for the last time for "The Garage", in which they play mechanics for whom everything goes wrong. It's clear that these two made a great comedy team. I'd go so far as to say that they were the Laurel and Hardy of their day. Probably would've continued had Arbuckle not gotten mired in a scandal.

As for the antics, there's a bathtub, a pole, and grease. I try to imagine how much fun everyone must've had filming it. I don't know if it's widely available (I saw it on YouTube).

Fun stuff.