wanbaclone

Youth Never Returns is a rather straightforward coming of age story chronicling the Chinese college experience. For those who have never lived in China and may be unaware, many college friendships last a lifetime. Because of the one child policy in China, many college students learn to live with a roommate for the first time in college, and consequently, the relationships become close friendships.

This particular film does a slightly above average job of setting the mood for first love, lost love, and the fleeting nature of youth. Comparable films from Hollywood would include The Big Chill and sex comedies like American Pie. Needless to say, there's nothing here worthy of an Oscar but as far as Chinese dramedies go, this is a pretty good one.

I like old movies, but I have a confession to make. I don't watch silent movies. There are two exceptions to this rule. I watch Charlie Chaplin movies and I watch The General. I have yet to see another movie starring Buster Keaton, and I've decided, if he'd never made a movie besides The General, he'd still be a legend. Neither Buster Keaton nor Chaplin needed words to tell a heck of a story. In fact, even if The General did't have title cards to tell you what was going on, you'd still be able to figure it out.

The plot is simple: Johnny Gray (played by Keaton) is an locomotive engineer in the South when the War of Northern Aggression, er, Civil War breaks out. His best gal, Annabelle Lee, snubs him when she mistakenly assumes he's a coward because he doesn't enlist (when in reality he's not allowed to enlist because he's more valuable as an engineer). What takes place over the next hour or so is a series of scenes in which Keaton bumbles his way into rescuing Annabelle from captors, foils a pack of Northern spies, and almost singlehandedly routes the Northern army. Most of the action takes place aboard the film's namesake, The General, Gray's locomotive.

The complaint against silent films is that there just isn't enough there without words to keep a viewer interested. Normally I agree, but Keaton's comic timing combined with numerous chase scenes keeps the pace lively. Kids under 10 are usually the toughest critics. I've heard and read many folks say that when they sat down with their young children to watch this one when the movie ended, the kids were ready for a repeat viewing.

One of my favorite gags of the movie comes when Gray tries to shoot a cannonball from a moving train in order to hit a train full of spies he's pursuing. With one misstep, he manages to aim the cannon directly at himself. It's hard to choose a favorite scene because one gag begets another throughout the running time of the movie, and at a time of 74 minutes, it's amazing how many funny bits Keaton packs in.