The Cook

What I love about this movie is that it feels like a live action cartoon, one of those Betty Boop-style cartoons where everyone seems to be made of rubber, and even the cars and buildings come to life and bounce to the music. That isn't exactly what happens in The Cook, but it sure is the "cartooniest" comedy Roscoe Arbuckle & Buster Keaton made together. This was the last short Buster appeared in before he shipped off to France for military service in the First World War, so it's all the more striking that everyone appears to be having so much fun. The Cook has a party atmosphere that's contagious, even now.

Most of the action is set in a medium-sized restaurant, where the clientèle is respectable and there's a jazz combo on hand to entertain. Roscoe is the cook, and this of course gives him the opportunity to perform a medley of his favorite food prep gags: flipping pancakes high in the air and catching them behind his back, playing "hacky-sack" with wads of dough, etc. Buster is the waiter, and we're treated to several close-ups that reveal just how amazingly handsome he was at this point in his life. The Cook isn't as violent as some of the other Keaton & Arbuckle shorts, but there's a gag early on that made me gasp: Roscoe is using a meat cleaver to chop a large fish, and when Buster unexpectedly flies headlong into the kitchen and lands on the chopping block, Roscoe brings the cleaver down on his neck! No harm done, however, just like cartoons.

The highlight is an impromptu musical number. An exotic dancer in an Arabian costume is performing for the customers, and although Buster is busy waiting tables the music inspires him to participate. His pseudo-Egyptian "snake dance" is great fun to watch, but back in the kitchen Roscoe manages to top him when he joins in, transforming common kitchen items into a Cleopatra costume. (He also works in a reference to Salome, using a cabbage as the head of John the Baptist.) Most of Roscoe's dance isn't visible to the patrons, he's just clowning back in the back for his own amusement -- and ours, of course. When he dances into the dining room and enhances his act by smashing plates no one is especially shocked or even much surprised, and the finale is greeted with a vigorous round of applause. The mood is downright giddy. Unfortunately the mood darkens when scuzzy Al St. John shows up and manhandles pretty cashier Alice Lake, but the staff at this establishment knows how to handle the undesirable element, and Luke the Dog is soon on call to teach the tough guy some manners. The next sequence features Roscoe, Buster, and two restaurant staffers eating spaghetti in a variety of funny ways; they turn a long strand into an impromptu clothes-line, Roscoe gets the food mixed up with his tie, etc. That's the joy of this film, there's no plot to worry about and no reason to hurry: these guys seem to have all the time in the world to sit around and perform clever gags. (Incidentally, the staffer with the big mustache is John Rand, familiar from a number of Chaplin films; Laurel & Hardy fans will recognize the other gent as Bobby Dunn, the cheerful shoplifter from Tit For Tat.)

The finale takes place in a nearby amusement park, where customers are borne in goat-carts. Al St. John reappears to menace Alice, so Luke obligingly reappears to menace Al. The last shots of the film are missing, unfortunately, but we're lucky we're able to see this much; The Cook was believed to be gone forever until the 1990s, when a portion of the film was found, and that section was matched up with another newly discovered fragment in 2002. The result is a funny and light-hearted comedy, offering modern day buffs a pleasant reunion with two great comedians supported by familiar colleagues, all having a blast.

I may be biased toward Buster Keaton since I have seen so many more of his films than of Fatty Arbuckle's, but I think that he was a far better physical comedian than Fatty was. Arbuckle performs some astonishing tricks as the cook, flipping pancakes behind his back and tossing utensils and such, and he should be recognized for this as well as his tremendous contributions to silent comedies. Both actors have much stronger works, but this is a clean short comedy, surprisingly well restored for having been sitting lost in some attic for more than 70 years. It makes me wish I was around back then, when the magic in Hollywood was still alive.

Although I am somewhat biased towards Harold Lloyd, I'm SERIOUSLY infatuated with Fatty Arbuckle comedies now. With a man his size, he was enormously agile, fearless and funny. This is plainly evident in The Cook, a classic example of his often riotous teamings with Stone Face, Buster Keaton. Essentially a bunch of gags which revolve around a restaurant, then an amusement park, Arbuckle just astounded me with his stunt work and clever slight of hand (his cooking stills was outstanding!). And oh dear, this movie is too funny. Many many pratfalls, comedic situations, and great comedic timing.. Seek it out if you can, it's a riot.

Long believed lost, an extended fragment of "The Cook" has been found, and it confirms how graceful Fatty could be, this time slaving over a hot stove and casually throwing prepared items to an equally blase Buster. Though the film closes at a pier-based amusement park, the kitchen antics are best, with the highlight being two dance pieces--Fatty's tribute to Salome (with salami) and Buster's hilarious rug-cutting with a belly dancer. The vicious (but not malicious) dog is good, too.

The pairing of Buster Keaton and Roscoe Arbuckle was fast becoming the most popular attraction on the movie screen in 1918. Fans flocked to the theaters in droves to witness the latest antics of the two genius comedians. Once the call for Americans to volunteer for the Great War kicked in earnest, Keaton decided to enlist in the United States Army. His reporting date for training at Camp Kearney, California, was July 24, 1918.

Before leaving, Keaton filmed what would be his final movie for several months, "The Cook," released in September 1918. Taking elements from his earlier 1916 "The Waiter's Ball," Arbuckle returned to familiar grounds of being a cook in a restaurant while expanding upon scenes in an amusement park. "The Cook" also served as showcase for one of the first inside jokes of a parody from a recent popular film, Theda Bara's "Cleopatra" of the previous year. Fatty dresses up like the Egyptian queen using kitchen implements and imitates Bara's emotional death scene by taking a long string of sausages, symbolizing an asp, and applying the end of the link onto his breast underneath a frying pan. Frustrated by the ineffectual poison of the meat, Arbuckle proceeds to eat the entire sausage link.

Keaton was shipped out to Europe after his training session in California. During his tour overseas, he slept in drafty tents, resulting in deafness in one ear. When the war was over in November 1918, the Army brass decided to keep the film star in Europe to entertain the remaining troops. His most popular act was "The Snake Dance," where Buster was dressed as an Egyptian dancer engaging with Theo The Snake--a long length of link sausage. If that sounds familiar, the sequence is exactly what appeared in "The Cook" when Keaton was dancing with Arbuckle in the kitchen appearing as ancient hopalong Egyptians.