The General is a silent movie starring Buster Keaton, who is a railway engineer during the American Civil War. His two loves are his train, The General, and Annabelle Lee, played by Marion Mack. When the Union steal The General with Annabelle aboard, he takes off in hot pursuit. Not only does he have to reclaim Annabelle and his train, but he must make it back into friendly soil to report plans of a Union attack.
Buster Keaton is legendary amongst fans of the silent movie era. One of his main selling points is his stunt work, which was performed all by the man himself. Certainly jumping on and off moving locomotives, leaping off cliffs, and diving through flames off a bridge are not things we would see of movie stars today.
He is also famous for his comedy. Some of the greatest jokes of the silent movie era were in Buster Keaton movies… apparently.
I tittered maybe twice throughout the whole film. Barely more than smiles. I failed to spot the jokes. I do like visual comedy. Throughout I couldn’t help but think of the Marx Brothers and Laurel and Hardy. Both of which have me in tears of laughter when I see them. I was hoping for more of the same with The General.
I really tried to find good points in this movie. One of which is that it is only 70 minutes long, which is admittedly about 40 minutes too long in my opinion. The stunt work from Mr Keaton was impressive. The man can throw himself about like a rag doll with seemingly little side effects. No doubt the film cost a few bob to make. The train crash through the bridge at the end was the most expensive single shot of the entire silent movie era. But nothing I saw can make me understand why this film is rated as being the 95th greatest movie ever made.
I struggled though this film simply because it’s part of my challenge. Had it not have been, I would have switched it off after barely 20 minutes. You wanted bad reviews, you got ‘em. 
Rating: 3/10
Top 100 position: 95
IMDb: The General
Buy it from: Amazon
Films remaining: 93
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