BusterKeaton remembered many of the gags Roscoe Arbuckle drew up in his film, March 1918's "The Bell Boy." The comedic actor used several of them in his much later movies when Buster was on his own. "The Bell Boy" shows the respect Arbuckle had for Keaton's talents in his equal pairing with the relatively-new film actor. This is the first film where the two work as a team--bellhops in a hotel that offers "Third-rate service for first-rate prices." The two formed what can be termed as one of cinema's first "fat and skinny" comedic teams, although the first may be Oliver Hardy and Bobby Ray's 1916 "Plump 'n Run" film.
The action is so breathlessly fast, as in all Arbuckle movies, the viewer is still laughing at one sequence when another follows in mere seconds. The horse-powered elevator, the winking wall-mounted moose head, the foiled bank robbery all are presented in rapid fashion. This film is the only instance where Buster appears with his father, Joe Keaton. His dad had formed years earlier The Three Keatons, which propelled his son into the entertainment business. He's seen as one of the hotel's cliental who constantly gets his hat knocked off, blaming Buster for the maneuver.
The action is so breathlessly fast, as in all Arbuckle movies, the viewer is still laughing at one sequence when another follows in mere seconds. The horse-powered elevator, the winking wall-mounted moose head, the foiled bank robbery all are presented in rapid fashion. This film is the only instance where Buster appears with his father, Joe Keaton. His dad had formed years earlier The Three Keatons, which propelled his son into the entertainment business. He's seen as one of the hotel's cliental who constantly gets his hat knocked off, blaming Buster for the maneuver.