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Who still watches silent films in 2025? Apparently, I do, and I still enjoy it: in fact, we even miss the human voice, but on the other hand, we can't help but feel that cinema, made this way, was almost as universal as music: overcoming the barriers of culture and language, we focus on what we are seeing, and on the physical expressiveness of the actors. And few actors were like Buster Keaton: he is able to deliver an entire speech using only gestures and facial expressions.

This film, today, would be impossible to make considering the sensitivities and scruples surrounding the American Civil War, a ghost that has never been so alive in the minds of America's people. I completely understand. Before this bloody, caustic war, the United States was a hodgepodge of different territories united under a flag. After this war, however, a country was born, a nation with an identity and character forged through fire, ashes and tears, and which still struggles today with the traumas and scars that result of such brutal birth. This film, however, was made a century ago, and is now celebrating its 100th anniversary! Those were different times, and Civil War was viewed with a different romanticism, almost as if one were reading about knights-errantry novels with audacious and idealistic knights, pure maidens, frightening dragons and an elusive Holy Grail lurking behind a rainbow. The film brings us this childish idealism, this simplicity, and tells us a story that we could almost use to lull a baby.

More important than the adventures that Johnny Gray experiences with his locomotive is the enormous work of filming and visual effects. Using simple techniques and the greatest possible realism, the film works well and enchants us with its elegance. It is also important to highlight the quality of the cinematography, filming and editing. For its time, this film must have been one of the studio's greatest investments, with the best quality actors and professionals. The humor may seem too bland for our taste today, but it worked well for me. It's a constructed humor that doesn't appear immediately, and is shaped by the film's rhythm.

Buster Keaton provides an extremely effective lead and gives us one of the most eloquent works of his career. I have no doubt that the actor, who was at the happiest moment of his artistic life, achieved a true masterpiece in this film that placed him on the level of eternity. Today, he is one of the actors we associate with the silent film era, you don't even have to think about it! Marion Mack and Jim Farley help a lot and give great performances, but we have to be honest: the film was made with Keaton and his enormous talent in mind, and the actor made the most of it... without having the slightest suspicion that, a few years later, the advent of "talkies" would end his stardom and bring his career down to a level far below the one he experienced here.

This is one of those films that promises a lot, but ends up giving us much less than it promised. The story begins with a school bus accident: while some try to deal with their grief as best they can, others express anger and indignation. And they are all approached by a skilled lawyer who will try to convince the children's parents to file a collective lawsuit against the city. Some accept willingly, others think that such a lawsuit will only keep the wounds open for too long and simply want some peace and quiet. In the midst of all this, the lawyer deals with his own problems, and with a daughter who got lost in the world of drugs.

I had already seen one of the films directed by Atom Egoyan ("Exotica"). That film left me with mixed feelings and is not the kind of film I want to see again. Likewise, this film will probably not be back on my list. The director has potential, his stories are charming, but he wanders too much due to his choice of a narrative style in which he is not skilled. Non-linear narrative is not for every filmmaker: you have to know how to edit the film in a way that the audience does not get lost easily, and that failed here: the film is a brutal mess even if we watch it carefully. It is as if I were trying to read a Shakespeare play written on numbered post-its, but all scattered around the furniture and corners of a room. I can see where everything is going, but I have to make a huge effort not to get lost amidst the jumble of flashbacks and irrelevant details with which I am bombarded.

The feeling I got is that Egoyan tried to reach a level of depth and intellectuality for which he was not prepared. He wanted to give the film an almost poetic dreamlike quality without, however, having the skills to work all of this in the most intelligent way. He was thinking about the intellectual audience of film festivals, but even that audience felt lost with this material. And what about the general audience? I don't think anyone feels motivated to watch a film full of depressed or angry characters, and where addictions, fear and death are almost everywhere... unless life is so immensely depressing that seeing such a parade of misery is, in some way, therapeutic!

That said, we are left with the cast, and I can't make any major criticisms about them. Ian Holm is always a worthy protagonist, after all, he is a veteran with a career that speaks for itself. As usual, he gives us a consistent effort, even if the material he was given may be weaker than he deserves. Bruce Greenwood does an equally decent job, but never good enough, and Gabrielle Rose and Sarah Polly just do what they are asked to do without adding anything relevant.

It is ironic that I decided to watch this film on the same morning that Iran was attacked by US bombers, but this choice was accidental: I only found out about the news when the film had finished. And I say that it seems ironic because the entire message of this film is precisely about the importance of peace.

Magnificently directed by Brad Bird, a director I was completely unfamiliar with, the film is an eloquent homage to the universe of the great sci-fi comic books that filled the children's imagination, in the 1960s, with invasions from outer space, ultra-modern robots and fearless war heroes. Americans were still living in the hubris of victory in World War II, and under the omnipresent threat of Communism, which Senator McCarthy and J. Edgar Hoover were, out of pure convenience, feeding as if it were a bonfire fueled by diesel. This film is set precisely at this period and plays a lot with the hopes, desires and paranoia of a nation drunk on its self-confidence and in permanent need of a sworn enemy, a target to be shot down. Yes, if today's enemy is Iran, the truth is that it was once Saddam's Iraq (twice), Bin Laden's terrorism, Kim Family's Korea, North Vietnam, Castro's Cuba... you get the point. So, let's talk about the film, or we'll get depressed with all that.

The plot couldn't be better, and the screenwriters deserve congratulations. Taking advantage of all the beauty of traditional animation, they wonderfully evoke the period and do a remarkable job with the plot, which, in addition to pertinent messages about peace, also has the tenderness of true friendship between an innocent child. The colors are fantastic, the animation work deserves applause and the soundtrack fits very well, giving movement or feeling at the proper moments. The character development was very balanced, with a convincing and likeable protagonist and a giant (the hero) who manages to captivate the audience's sympathy without any difficulty. Otherwise, the voice cast does a very dignified and elegant job, with special emphasis on the efforts of Chris MacDonald, Jennifer Aniston and Vin Diesel.

This is not a film for children, but it is also not a film unsuitable for them if they are, at least, old enough to understand what they are watching. It is one of those films that we can watch with the family together at Christmas, Easter or any other happy time, without fear or guilt. One interesting thing: considering that it is a 25-year-old film, it is extraordinary to feel how it has barely aged a day. And in a world that seems to be heading towards another world war, I believe that it is worth watching films that remind us how peace, dialogue and friendship are values in the name of which it is worth (stop) fighting.