From director Gerald Potterton (Heavy Metal), this short film
starring
Buster Keaton was one of the last films of Keaton's long career. As
"the railrodder" he crosses Canada from east to west on a railway track
speeder. True to his genre, the film is full of sight gags as Keaton
putt-putts his way to British Columbia. Not a word is spoken
throughout, and Keaton is as spry and ingenious at fetching laughs as
he was in the days of the silent slapsticks.
A quote from the article
"On the Rails" (From Eighteen Bridges; Stories that Connect)
At one point in the
documentary (which itself is a black-and-white
tribute to a vanished Canada) the citizens of Rivers, Manitoba gave
Keaton the key to their city. A painfully shy man who loathed public
appearances, especially when he was the centre of attention, Keaton was
nonetheless moved nearly to tears by the gesture. A kilted band had
piped him and his wife into the ceremony (O Canada of the kilts and
Manitoba mayors handing out keys!), and even this quaint homage humbled
the great comedian. The emotion on his famously-stoic face is deeply
moving to witness now. He had lived large for a long time, and his
life, like The Railrodder, was approaching its terminus. The blend of
the comic and tragic, the blend that defines our lives, is writ clearly
on the private Keaton’s face as he blinks at the citizens of
Rivers, and writ with even greater clarity on the screen Keaton’s
back as he stands on the shores of Boundary Bay and gazes westward.
http://www.eighteenbridges.com/story/rails
You Tube Link
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EiqqxyZeDXo
National Film
Board Site:
http://www.nfb.ca/film/railrodder/
The Railrodder
(VGuide)
http://www.ovguide.com/the-railrodder-9202a8c04000641f800000000478cf0b
Buster Keaton
Rides Again (Video link)
http://www.nfb.ca/film/buster_keaton_rides_again/
NFB Blog - The
Railrodder
http://blog.nfb.ca/blog/2009/12/11/buster-keaton-rides-the-rails-in-canada/
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