Sherlock Jr. (1924)

User Rating:

8.5/10   

Director:

Buster Keaton

Writers:

Clyde Bruckman (writer)
Jean C. Havez (writer)

Release Date:

21 April 1924 (USA)

Genre:

Short | Action | Comedy | Crime | Fantasy | Mystery

Plot:

A film projectionist longs to be a detective, and puts his meagre skills to work when he is framed by a rival for stealing his girlfriend's father's pocketwatch.

Plot Keywords:

Projectionist | Film In Film | Explosion | Car In Water | Movie Reality Crossover

Awards:

1 win

Cast

Buster Keaton	...	Sherlock, Jr. / Projectionist
Kathryn McGuire	...	The girl
Joe Keaton	...	Her father
Erwin Connelly	...	The butler / handyman
Ward Crane	...	The sheik / villain

Runtime:

45 min

Country:

USA

Language:

None

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Sound Mix:

Silent

Certification:

UK:U | Portugal:M/6 | Finland:S | Spain:T | USA:Unrated

Filming Locations:

Larchmont Blvd. near Beverly Blvd., Los Angeles, California, USA

Company:

Buster Keaton Productions

Trivia:

For the sequence in which Buster Keaton's "dream-self" enters the "movie within a movie," Keaton employed the power of suggestion. He shot an actual movie featuring Ward Crane and Kathryn McGuire in a living room setting. As the sequence begins, the movie is playing on the theater movie screen. The film cuts back and forth between Buster sleeping in the projection booth, and his "dream-self" climbing on stage as the movie is showing. In the scene where Buster's "dream-self" steps through the movie screen and into the movie, the living room setting was re-created on the theater stage, and a large hole was cut in the movie screen for Keaton to step through. The actors were placed in the living room setting, creating the illusion that Buster stepped inside the movie screen to join them.

Goofs:

Miscellaneous: As Buster falls asleep, the film begins unspooling onto the floor. When Buster wakes up, if nobody fixed it, there should be a large pile of film on the floor. And if someone fixed it, why didn't they wake him up?

Quotes:

The sheik: We are lost! He is sending for the world's greatest detective - Sherlock Jr.!

Movie Connections:

Referenced in The Projectionist (1971)

marvellous and inventive

This Keaton classic is both funny and extremely clever in its construction. Our hero is a cleaner but dreams of becoming a detective, always with his nose buried in a book on the subject.

The first third of the film is much like any other comedy. There are lost dollar bills, things sticking to other things, something stolen, mistaken identities. Our heroine is introduced in a charming scene where they seem terrified to hold hands. Her father is played by Buster's father Joe Keaton, who would appear in many of his son's films.

There's a mustachioed cad with slick hair and a sharp suit who is after the girl, a cartoon baddie who the audience instinctively knows deserves a hiss and not a cheer.

It is in Junior's other job as a cinema projectionist that the film comes alive. We are watching the film he has set up and then, suddenly, he is part of the action. In a sequence of great inventiveness, we see the film within a film changing scenes and watch with delight as the character adapts to each situation and surrounding.

Sherlock Jr is very funny but is also unusual and, in comparison with other comedies of the period, ahead of its time. It includes some excellent stunts that are the equal of anything done by Harold Lloyd in the same period, and, although it has a very short running time, manages to develop a good storyline throughout.

Justly feted as a masterpiece of silent comedy, Sherlock Jr represented one of the peaks of Buster Keaton's cinematic career. It is a film worth watching and has stood up well today.