The Man who Laughs (1928)

Today's film is The Man who Laughs. There is so much going on, with so many long names of characters, that I feel like I should read the book before I watch this.  But I'm not.  It's not a horror film, but instead is an underrated example of German Expressionism.  Its moodiness and balance of shadows, along with its hideous star, can easily make someone think it's horror.  It's more of romance than anything.

Gwynplaine was the son of a nobleman who insulted King James II.  His father was killed, while he was permanently disfigured by comprachicos so that his mouth would have a permanent grin - so he could "forever laugh at his fool of a father".  According to Victor Hugo, the author, comprachicos were like surgeons that would mutilate children early in life so they would grow up to be freaks.  Gwynplaine is said to be the inspiration for the Joker.

Gwynplaine, alone, and having no memory of his father, wanders around and finds a baby.  He brings it to a house and begs to come inside.  The man who takes them in is Ursus, a mountebank (later a playwright).  The baby, who is blind, is named Dea, and together they grow up.  Dea grows up to be very beautiful, and she is fond of Gwynplaine.  However, he doesn't feel that he deserves anyone's love or to marry anyone because of his disfigured face.

Someone recognizes the adult Gwynplaine and tells the royal court that he should be a member because of his father.  Lots of royal court drama happens, and Josiana, the duchess who currently holds Gwynplaine's position in court, goes down to see him at work.  Right now Gwynplaine and Dea are putting on a show that Ursus has written.  Everyone laughs at his face, even though he looks terrifying instead of funny, but Josiana likes him.  Still, in the end she is put off by his face.

More royal court drama happens, and Queen Anne (who succeeded King James II's place) orders Josiana to marry Gwynplaine so he could have his spot back.  But, Gwynplaine, realizing that he and Dea belong together, refuses and runs away back to Dea.  However, Ursus and Dea have been banished from the country.  Gwynplaine finds them at their ship in the harbor and sails away with them.  He would rather be poor and be with his true love then live life as a nobleman without her.

Even though a lot of stuff happens, it feels that even more stuff was left out.  Also, some scenes take a while to get to their points.  Still, for a silent film it isn't too over-acted.  I will give this film a 7/10.

La souriante Madame Beudet (The Smiling Madame Beudet) 1923

Today's film is The Smiling Madame Beudet.  Even though it does not have a long running time, the entire story could have been told in ten minutes.  Madame Beudet is depressed and has a rude husband, who doesn't treat her very tell and plays a cruel joke on her by holding a gun to his head and pretending to shoot himself.  The gun is never loaded, so there is no actual danger.  It still isn't a funny joke though.

While her husband is away watching a play, Madame Beudet loads the gun.  Then she spends the entire next day regretting her decision and dramactically moping around the house.  Then her husband and his friend come home looking for a lost receipt.  Later, after his friend has left, he calls her in and yells at her, doing his gun trick again.  Then he aims at her and fires.  However, he is a terrible shot and hits a vase instead.  He believes that she wanted to kill herself by loading the gun.  He tells her that he cannot live without her and hugs her.  However, she is not pleased at all by this outcome and we know who she was really hoping to die.

This film was a bit too long even for a short film, and there isn't a whole lot of substance to it.  Still, it's okay for a silent film.  I will give it a 5/10.

Metropolis (1927)

Today's film is Metropolis. It is one of the best science fiction films I have ever seen.  It is also eerily prophetic, especially here in America.  Even though we're not as bad as some countries, there is still a sharp divide between the lower and upper classes, and the middle class is becoming extinct.

In the world of Metropolis, the city planners and the rest of the upper class live in a beautiful garden utopia on the surface.  The lower class, known as the "workers" run the machines underground that power the city.  The workers live deep underground, below the machines.  Some of them, especially the children, have probably never seen sunlight.

Freder, the son of the city's mastermind, sees a woman surrounded by children and follows her deep underground.  He has never seen this part of the city before and had no idea what the workers have to go through in order to keep the above-land comfortable.  The woman is Maria and she is sort of a preacher/prophet that believes that there needs to be a mediator between the workers and the city planners.  She says the brains of the city and the hands that work needs a heart to come between them.

Meanwhile, Freder's dad, Joh Frederson is working with Rotwang, an inventor.  Rotwang looks like an angry Beethoven and he is building a robot that never tires or makes a mistake.  Frederson tells angry Beethoven to make the robot look just like Maria, so she can stir discord among the workers.  Then, they capture Maria and lock her up.

Rotwang's invention is successful and Maria-bot convinces the workers to destroy the machines.  Both Maria and her robot double were played by Brigitte Helm, and she does an awesome job portraying the two different personalities.  A lot of the acting is bad silent film over-acting, but that's all silent films so it's okay. 

So since Maria-bot got all the workers to destroy the machines, all of the underground areas start flooding!  Especially the worker's underground city!  The real Maria escapes and rescues all the children trapped in the city.  Meanwhile, the workers tie up Maria-bot and burn her at the stake like a witch.  This shows that in times of panic, lots of people will turn to superstition.  But the real Maria saves the day and meets up with Freder, who kisses her.  Freder now can act like the heart, or mediator, between the working class and the city planners.  And they lived happily ever after.

I didn't understand the skeleton playing the flute, the seven sins or stuff like that.  This film didn't need all of those abstract things in there.  I felt it took away from the movie.  Other than that, the movie was great.  I will give it a 9/10.

The Jazz Singer (1927)

Today's film is The Jazz Singer.  It is regarded as the first talking picture ever made.  Actually it's more like a half silent film/half musical.  Still it was amazing that they were able to transition from silent to talking films so quickly once they figured it out.

The story is predictable and easy to follow.  A Jewish cantor's son does not want to follow in his father footsteps, instead he wants to sing Jazz.  Jazz was like the rock and roll of its time when it comes to parents hating music and the father is royally pissed off that his son wants to sing this garbage.  So the son, Jakie, leaves, changes his name to the more acceptable and less Jewish-sounding Jack Robin, and sings jazz.  He is "discovered" by a beautiful dancer named Mary, and he has a crush on her.

As an adult, he gets a part on Broadway, which is an accomplishment that any parent should be proud of.  But oh no, not his dad.  Jack comes home and sings to his understanding and loving mother.  Then he sings the same song in jazz style.  His dad storms in and throws him out of the house.

This was the only picture I could find that
didn't show him in blackface.  I don't want
to end up on some government list.

His dad falls ill and cannot sing at the service for the Day of Atonement, one of the most important days of the year.  His mom and family friend go to give the guilt trip to Jack to force him to sing.  Unfortunately, this day falls on the opening of the Broadway musical he's in and singing at the service means giving up his beginning Broadway career.  His mom lays on the guilt trip hard, and Jack points out that his dad was the one who threw him out of the house.  Meanwhile, their friend cannot find anyone to sing for the service.  Really? They're having trouble finding a Jewish person in New York City?  The guilt trip works and Jack sings for the service.

His dad hears him singing from his room, and says, "We finally have our son back", and dies.  What a sorry excuse for a parent.  He never supported anything he did. Children are going to have different wants, and may go down a different path than we do.  Jack didn't do drugs, or steal, all he wanted was to sing.  And because he didn't sing exactly as his father wanted, he was hateful towards him until the moment he died.  He never got to see Jack open on Broadway like his mother did, and honestly he wouldn't have cared.  I felt bad for Jack.

The main reason to watch this film is not for story purposes, but for historical purposes.  What would it have been like to only see silent films, and then actually hear someone sing during it?  I think it would have be amazing.  I will give this film a 7/10.

The Phantom of the Opera (1925)

I'm back from my beach vacation.  Even though we only live 35 minutes from a beach, our work schedules make it impossible to go, but we made time for our 5th wedding anniversary.  So I'm back to writing and today's film is The Phantom of the Opera.  In today's standards, it's not scary, but it is a good classic version of the story and there is no annoying singing.

 

I was wondering how they were going to portray an opera because it's a silent film.  It would be no good to watch Christine, who is supposed to be an amazing soprano, if we couldn't hear her.  So I was very surprised to actually hear her!  I know the audio didn't match the video perfectly, but that was before they had that kind of technology.  They did the best they could with what they had and it works.  Also, the music in this film is far better than most silent films I've seen.

 

So, the Phantom is infatuated with Christine and wants to make her a star.  So he threatens the owners of the theatre with a curse if they let Carlotta sing instead of her.  She isn't afraid of ghosts and sings anyway.  The Phantom responds by causing the giant chandelier to crash down!  That thing is so ginormous.  He could have easily killed several people and he doesn't even care. 

 

Lon Chaney did his "Phantom" makeup himself.  He used shading to make his face look more skull-like. His nose was held back by hooks in the nose connected to a string.  It was the only way to give the illusion of having no nose and it made his actual nose bleed during filming!  But he did it anyway! He was such a boss.  When his mask is off, his ears are taped back, but whenever he's wearing the mask, his ears are clearly not taped back.

 

I always wondered why the Phantom was so butt ugly.  Watching different versions of the film didn't help because they give him a different story.  This film is closest to the novel, which I totally read and not the sparknotes.  The Phantom looks that way because he was born that way.  It's some kind of birth deformity, but it doesn't match anything in reality.

I was also surprised by the use of color in this film.  The most use of color was during the masquerade ball.  Sure, it's scattered, but I can tell they tried.  I like it when black & white films are tinted, such as the green for the basement, because it adds interest.  My co-film critic also enjoyed this aspect.  She's a nonverbal autistic girl and tries hard to find something to focus on, and with black & white films this is very hard.  The tinted scenes break up the monotony for her.  She also really liked Lon Chaney, because he is expressive with his hands.  I told her that this is because his parents also could not speak and used their hands.  She has since then used much more sign language to convey what she wants rather than screeching.  I am very happy about this.

Overall, both of us enjoyed watching this film and this is one of the better adaptations we have seen.  I will give it a 7/10.

The Unknown (1927)

Today's film is The Unknown, a moody dark piece starring Lon Chaney as the villain.  He plays Alonzo, an armless knife thrower/gun shooter in the circus.  He's in love with Nanon, the circus owner's daughter.  Unfortunately, so is the strongman, Malabar.

Joan Crawford is stunningly beautiful as Nanon.  She's afraid of men's hands and often comes to Alonzo for comfort.  What she doesn't know is that he really does have hands and is just pretending. I know.  Alonzo's friend, Cojo, is the only one who knows his secret and tells him that if he really wants to marry Nanon, she's going to find out he has arms eventually.

I felt bad for Malabar because he seems like a genuinely nice person.  He's constantly rejected by the disgusted Nanon for the sole reason of him having arms.  I'm glad she got over her fear though.

Alonzo decides that the best course of action is to blackmail a surgeon into cutting his arms off.  While he is recuperating, Nanon gets over her fear of hands and agrees to marry the handsome Malabar.  Take a look at this guy, he is really nice looking and strong:

Alonzo finds this out while visiting Nanon after his surgery.  It's not like he can put his arms back on now!  While Lon Chaney may be the man of a thousand faces, a lot of them do border on overacting.  He ranges from disbelief at Nanon's loss of fear of hands, upset that he had the surgery, and hatred for his rival Malabar.  He plots to use his next strongman act against him to cut off his arms/kill him.  Can he succeed? No, Malabar is unhurt while Alonzo is killed accidentally by one of the horses in the act.  Without him to come between them, Malabar and Nanon can live happily ever after.

I often enjoy watching films about the circus, and this is a good introduction to Todd Browning's films.  A few years later, he will have another film involving circus life called Freaks.  I will give this film a 7/10.

Körkarlen (The Phantom Carriage) (1921)

Today's film is The Phantom Carriage.  It is a dark drama, but has some spectacular effects for a film from the 1920's.

One thing that is interesting is that this film has different stories within the main story.  The main story is that Sister Edit is dying of TB and wishes to see David before she passes.  David is too busy drinking with his buddies to bother coming.  The friends talk about a legend where the last person to die on New Year's Eve, if they are a great sinner, will be forced to drive Death's carriage and pick up dead people for a year.  After getting smacked on the head with a beer bottle, Death's carriage driver, who just happens to be his friend who died last year of all coincidences, comes to pick him up.  Through flashbacks, we learn just how awful David is and how drinking has destroyed his life.

He gets to see Edit before she dies and realizes how terrible a person he was.  Then his wife decides to kill herself and their children while he is powerless to stop her.  He is so upset that he prays and begs for someone to spare them.  Death decides that he has learned his lesson and returns David to his body where he races home to stop his wife.  And he does.  The main theme of this movie is that alcohol is a great evil that will cause you to be addicted at the first sip and must be avoided at all costs.

The best part was the special effects.  Death and David can pass through walls, and Death lifts the person's soul right out of their body.  It is easy to tell how they did this, but it is still impressive for the year it was made.  It was made with double exposures made in the camera as optical printing wasn't available yet.  Since the cameras were hand-cranked, they had to be cranked at the exact same speed for each exposure in order to work.  I will give this film a 7/10.

Our Hospitality (1923)

Today's film is Our Hospitality, which is yet another Buston Keaton film.  Really, another?  Why do we need another?  We already have The General and Steamboat Bill Jr, and they were enjoyable.  We don't need another film from the same director, especially when they are of the same genre.  If a director has films under multiple genres, say, horror, drama and comedy, then it is important to view and compare the works.  But, I have no desire to watch yet another physical comedy that offers nothing unique to the audience.  Also, the list doesn't need 15 vampire films.  It just doesn't.

 

So, this film is about the Hatfields and the McCoys, two families in the 1830's that hated each other.  Their feud got so bad that people remember it to this day.  Except this film changes it to the Canfields and Mckays, for reasons I don't know.  The baby Willie Mckay is sent to live in New York away from the feud.  Twenty years later, he returns to claim his inheritance.  He meets a girl on the train heading there.  Of course it turns out she's part of the rival family.

The girl invites him to her house for supper and her brothers and father are planning to kill him.  However, their code of honor states that they cannot kill him while he is a guest in their house.  So, he gets comfy and stays for days!  Later, he tries to escape which results in all manner of physical comedy.  Eventually, he marries the girl in the upstairs bedroom, which is totally normal.

That's it.  If you like physical comedy and dialogue heavy silent films where you have to read a lot, you'll like this.  I will give this a 5/10.

Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans (1927)

Today's film is Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans.  It's a simple film, and yet it is sweet.  This film is so simple that nobody even has a name.  There's the man, his wife, and the woman from the city.  You know that woman is going to be trouble.

So, the man, being bored in the country with his boring farmwife, meets the exciting woman from the city while she is on vacation.  Then, he cheats on his wife with her.  They want to run away to the city together.  The woman tells him to drown his wife.

So, the husband tells his wife that they are going on the lake.  The wife is so excited to be noticed and to go out.  It seems like he hasn't paid attention to her in a while.  He goes to try and grab her to push her overboard, but can't do it.  They reach the shore, and the wife, having realized what's going on, runs away in terror.  The husband follows her and tries to apologize.  He even goes and gets her a plate of sandwiches.  She cries and her husband is like, "Don't be like that; look, I bought sandwiches!"

They witness a wedding nearby and the husband realizes how awful he's been to her.  Not just the whole trying to drown her thing, but the ignoring and cheating on her.  He begs her to forgive him, and she does.  Then, they spend an enjoyable night on the town while involves getting pigs drunk.

When they return to the boat to go home, the weather is getting stormy.  They fall out of the boat and the husband believes she is gone.  But she's not.  Once she is found, everyone is happy.  The woman from the city silently goes back home and nothing happens to her.  And the husband and wife and their baby (who appears from time to time) live happily ever after.

The story itself is simplistic, but I liked how the man and his wife interacted with each other.  Like when they went in to get a portrait done and broke a statue.  Their actions are just so natural, especially their facial expressions which help tell the story.  This movie didn't need any talking, and it is surprising how much I didn't miss it.  I will give this film an 8/10.

Sherlock Jr (1924)

Here is a delightful short film featuring Buster Keaton.  The special effects in the dream sequence were pretty good considering this was over 90 years ago.  Such as when his spirit-like "dream self" emerges from his body while he sleeps on the job.  Also, he jumps through a lady and vanishes.

 

I like that he does his own stunts.  He runs across the top of the train and jumps down the water tower.  I heard from someone that he got injured doing this stunt.  I am too tired to verify this.  Also, he rides on the handlebars of a motorcycle all across the countryside.  I didn't know anyone could do that.  I thought you had to hold on to the handlebars in order to keep the engine running.  I've ridden on motorcycles but never driven one myself.  Oh, and he gets stuck on the roof and jumps on the railroad gate and sails down. Look:

 

 

 

 

That was neat.  I'm glad this was only 45 minutes because there was not enough story to keep it going any longer.  I'm going to give this a 6/10 because for a physical comedy, there wasn't a lot of comedy.  If I wanted to watch an action-filled comedy, I would choose a Stephen Chow/Jackie Chan film over this any day.

Nanook of the North (1922)

A little baby with little puppies!

Today's documentary is Nanook of the North, one of the first full length documentaries ever made.  It focuses on Nanook, a hunter in Northern Canada, and his family of Eskimos.

It mainly focuses on stereotypes of Eskimos - seal hunting, dogsledding and Eskimo kisses.  We don't get to see them as regular people. What are they thinking about?  Do they like living where it is so cold?  This film is nothing better than a Nat Geo special.  It's so concerned with showing what they are that it never asks who they are. And that's a shame.  They did show a lot of the cute babies and puppies though. I'm giving this a 5/10.

Chelovek s kino-apparatom (Man with a Movie Camera) (1929)

Here is a documentary in its purest form: A man goes around town literally documenting everything that happens. And so many things happen!

Life

We see people filling out marriage certificates as well as divorce certificates.  We see the preparations of a funeral, and a woman crying near a grave. At the same time, we see a baby's coming into the world. I love babies! The scenes are edited neatly to show us all of this happening at the same time.  We see that all stages of life happen all the time, even in a small town or city.  Somewhere down the road someone has just died, and at the same time, a baby has been born in a nearby hospital.  Life is always happening.

Work

It's time to go to work!  I loved seeing the old machinery of the factories.  I had no idea that there was so much technology back in the 1920's. The camera catches the intricacies of the gears and other moving parts, and how they move so seamlessly to keep everything running. The sewing machines work on the same principle as my own, only mine has more features.  No matter what kind of job a person has, they all smile at the camera.

Play

Now it's time for fun. The man with the camera goes to the beach and films people tanning and swimming. Next is a montage of people playing sports. This section is quick-paced and exciting.

Beach Aerobics!

The Man Himself

The Man with the movie camera goes to great lengths to get his prize shots. He lays on a railroad track to film a train, and actually stands on a moving car to film passers-by.  He hung off the side of a train to get some good footage as well.  Then everything was edited by a lady. This part should be called "The Lady in the Editing Room". Without editing, there wouldn't be a film, just random footage.  Honestly, this film is edited together much better than most modern films. You have to see it to believe it. I will give this film a 9/10.

Nosferatu (1922)

So, the quest for a horror movie that actually scares me continues.  I heard many great things about this movie. I was even lured in by the Netflix description which states, "the scariest Dracula adapation ever". No, it's not. It's not bad, it's just not scary.  I don't want a film with gore; I'm in the hospital regularly and seeing blood doesn't bother me. Jump scares are cheap. They're meant to startle, not scare.  I'm just so disappointed with every horror film I see.

Here's Count Orlok. He looks like Count Chocula. He makes me really want chocolately breakfast cereal.

Note that he's not named Count Dracula, because that would be copying the book.  The director did try to change a few things so he wouldn't be sued. But he got sued anyway.  At least he didn't do anything unforgivable like make the vampires sparkle.


Like I said, I watched this on Netflix, but instead of the original soundtrack, they replaced with some really awful music. So, as usual when I watch silent films, I turn on Pandora. And it was awesome. The best part was when Count Orlok is on the ship, and the sailors start dying off. One of the sailors goes down to the hull to check things out. Then, the song "Sail" by AWOLNATION came on.  The entire song matched flawlessly with the tempo of the film. That just turned up the viewing experience to 11.

I was a little perturbed by this scene. Ellen is waiting for her husband to come home from Transylvania, and goes to relax at the beach. That sounds fine. But why are there crosses everywhere? Is this a graveyard beach? What is going on here? And why, throughout the movie, does she keep have the psychic moments where her eyes get really huge? Is it Nosferatu's hold on her? Because this is not explained whatsoever in the film. There were a lot of things not explained. It's as if the filmmakers expected us to read Dracula and at the same time accept this as a different story. Not happening. I'm giving this film a 4/10.

Das Cabinet des Dr. Caligari (The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari) (1920)

Wow, here is a silent film that kept my attention so much that I didn't even notice it was silent.  It starts outside in a mental asylum where a guy, Francis, is telling a story. This story is the plot of the film.  A lot of films are like this: told in a flashback by one character. Just get to the point already.

So Francis and his friend are both in love with the same girl. They all go to the carnival together. At this carnival, there is a sideshow featuring a somnambulist named Cesare.  What is a somnambulist ? Turns out it's just a fancy word for someone who sleepwalks. He can see the future, and is being controlled by Dr. Caligari.  We soon learn that Dr. Caligari is hypnotizing Cesare to kill people! Cesare kills Francis's friend and then kidnaps his girlfriend! Francis rescues her and discovers the truth - that Dr. Caligari is running the mental institution and has become obsessed with finding a somnambulist to control. But soon we learn the REAL truth, which also provides us with the very first film twist in history. This movie had a lot of action, and not too much overacting like we see in a lot of silent films.

Wait a second, was any of this real? Was his ladyfriend in any danger? Did any of this really happen? Did Cesare the somnambulist exist at all? Remember at the start of the movie we were being told a story by a man at a mental asylum.  We just saw a silent rendition of the rantings of a crazy person. I'm giving this film a 7/10. Awesome.

Seven Chances (1925)

Today's film selection is Seven Chances.  Buster Keaton plays a bachelor, James 'Jimmie' Shannon, who stands to inherit $7 million dollars if he can marry someone by his 27th birthday. Why did I choose this movie? Because today is my 27th birthday!

Jimmie and his work partner need money for work or else they'll get in trouble. While pondering their financial misfortune, they decide on the obvious choice of ditching work to go to the country club. Little do they know someone with good news is tailing them. He finally gets to meet them and shares the good news of Jimmie's inheritance.

He asks his girl Mary to marry him. She says yes, but when she finds out that they must wed today, he tells her he is going to receive a lot of money if he marries some girl today.  Mary then surprises us by refusing to marry for money.  She loves the guy already, she accepted his offer before she knew about the money, and he proved himself to not think before speaking. Most husbands don't. So I don't see a problem here.

The three men go somewhere and Jimmie points out seven girls he knows. I am impressed he remembered all their names because all of them look exactly alike. He manages to strike out with every single woman. '20s humor abounds when he deftly avoids proposing to a Jewish woman and a black woman, but approaches a white girl in the barbershop, not realizing it's a dummy head. He goes backstage to a woman's show, not realizing but it's too late that the woman is acutally Julian Eltinge, a famous female impersonator who was not pleased to be proposed to.

His friends print an ad in the local paper telling of his predicament. Meanwhile, on his way to the church Jimmie "proposed to everyone wearing a skirt, including a Scotchman." But that's okay, he was white. Soon he has hundreds of potential brides vying for him. But he finally gets the message from Mary and heads off to her house.

The scene fade-ins and fade-outs are very well done. If anyone thinks that silent films are slow, boring and not worth watching, needs to watch a comedy like this. The scene where all the potential brides chase him through the football field was funny. Plus that dude can run. Movie gets a 6/10.

Un chien andalou (An Andalusian Dog) (1929)

I don't even know where to begin. There is nothing I can say that will explain this. I guess this is more of a surreal art piece than an actual film. Film will get a 6/10 for being a pretentious art piece. If I really wanted to see something of Dali's I'd rather drive over to Tampa to that museum of his than watch a movie. Honestly. Also they slice a lady's eyeball for no reason, there's ants coming out of people's hands, and that's gross.

Bronenosets Potyomkin (Battleship Potemkin) (1925)

So what if this is a propaganda piece? It works!  All those poor sailors out there on a boat, who are kept down by The Man.  And then they try and feed them rotten meat. That stuff had bugs in it! Are the sailors going to put up with that? Hells no. It's time to stand up against the man.  Even when the people get attacked by the evil government, the sailors are there to protect them.

For a silent film, I enjoyed watching this. And that's saying a lot. I give this a 6/10.

Steamboat Bill, Jr (1928)

I have a hard time with silent films because they rely almost entirely on visuals, and I have difficulty following them. But I did enjoy this film, as well as most of the films featuring Buster Keaton. His athleticism adds to the physical comedy. Also, the movie inspired Steamboat Willie, which was the first Mickey Mouse cartoon with sound.

It was amazing how he just ran from one boat to another, all the way to the top of the wheelhouse. Dude just leapt all the way up their.  Then he rescues his dad from jail and there's a cyclone and everything. So much was happening. One of the most famous scenes is when the wall falls down on Buster Keaton, and he passes safely through a window. That was actually done with a full-weight wall and would have killed him if he missed.  I give it an 8/10.