User Reviews

Yes, he does. We get to hear him put on his Irish accent too.

John Spotton and his crew from the NFB were there in 1964 as Gerald Potterton and his own NFB crew were filming Buster Keaton in his title role as "The Railrodder".

He see Keaton and Potterton as they conceive gags familiar to many Canadians -- of my generation, certainly -- from that funny colour short and wonderful Canadian travelogue. The latter was perhaps the real reason we were shown "The Railrodder" as Wolf Cubs, by our Akela at a pack gathering of the early '70's, if memory serves. (As a little boy, I consequently thought Keaton was Canadian.)

Probably the most valuable point about this documentary is that we see Keaton's actual uncredited role in the making of the Potterton film, as writer, director, and even producer. It was probably natural given his seniority and cinematic experience, and we get to see it, a little bit anyway, as it really happened. Keaton, in general, comes across as a wise old man of the movies, anecdote-filled and a little puckish. Keaton, in "The General", comes across as hilarious, and this film includes some extended sequences from that 1927 gem.

As a point of interest, John Spotton as a name is most familiar around these parts these days as the John Spotton Theatre, the cinema located in the National Film Board building downtown at the corner of John and Richmond. (Stop by the next time you're in Toronto -- that neighbourhood is on the tourist itinerary.)

I must confess that although I'm a lifelong fan of Buster Keaton's work I've never much cared for The Railrodder, the short comedy he made late in his life for the National Film Board of Canada. That's the one where Buster travels across Canada in a strange-looking mechanized rail car, and it feels more like a travelogue or an extended commercial than a comedy, like something made to please the Canadian Tourism Bureau. While the colorful scenery is pleasant enough, the material Buster was given to perform feels slight and only mildly amusing at best. Still, I'm glad the film was made for several reasons. First, seeing as how Keaton had been neglected and shoved aside for so many years, reduced to supporting roles and cameos, it's a pleasure to note that here, at last, he received star treatment in a film built entirely around his persona, even if the gags are on the weak side. God knows it beats the Beach Party series! Buster and his wife Eleanor had a good time making The Railrodder, and we know this because a second camera crew was on hand recording the process for a behind-the-scenes documentary, a separate film that came to be known as Buster Keaton Rides Again. This fascinating movie gives us a rare look at Keaton at work, a Portrait of the Artist as an Old Man that is poignant, informative and funny, and considerably more satisfying than the project it set out to document.

Viewers unfamiliar with Buster's life and career who are interested in learning something about him will find a brisk outline here, giving the basic details. There is a summary of Keaton's stage career featuring a number of interesting photos, and clips from his best-known feature film The General, unfortunately backed with inappropriate, jangly piano music. The biographical section is okay as far as it goes, but the real reason to see this is the behind-the-scenes footage of Buster interacting with wife Eleanor, The Railrodder's young director Gerald Potterton, and various others. Buster tells stories about Louis B. Mayer, signs autographs for excited young fans, celebrates his 69th birthday, accepts the Key to the City in a dreary-looking town, and even strums his guitar and sings a couple of old ditties in his croaky, four-pack-a-day voice. Those songs alone are worth the price of admission.

Buster's singing gives us a taste of old-time vaudeville, and also points up the waste of his talents at MGM in the early talkie era. Why didn't they have him do this sort of thing? Well, no matter, at least this documentary captures the man at work and play, and more than makes up for the weaknesses of The Railrodder.

Traveling through Canada while filming the amusing short film 'The Railrodder', Buster Keaton is observed both on and off set in this little seen documentary. Though hardly the most loquacious entertainer, Keaton proves to be an interesting behind-the-camera personality as he debates whether certain scenes in 'The Railrodder' are thrills or gags and as he shares anecdotes about celebrities such as Cecil B. DeMille. The documentary is a tad uneven a ride though (pun intended) as it pulls between focusing on Keaton backstage and recounting Keaton's childhood and initial rise to fame; fascinating a career as Keaton certainly had, the highlights of 'Rides Again' are the scenes of Keaton conversing - and singing. There is also an overload of footage from 'The General' interspersed throughout - no doubt to justify the title as Keaton also rides railway tracks in 'The Railrodder' - but less footage from 'The General' and more from the inventive likes of 'Sherlock Jr.' may have worked better. Flawed as it may be though, 'Rides Again' is an easy film to warm to. While clearly not as healthy and agile as in his prime, Keaton is enthusiastic as ever about finding ways to make his audiences laugh and the candid insight the film offers into his mind at work, always thinking up different ways to find humour in life, truly resonates.

Did you know that it was actually the legendary "Fatty" Arbuckle who gave Keaton his first break in cinema? That was when he was an extra on some "Keystone Cops" sketches and the star saw potential in this former Vaudeville artist. This documentary itself doesn't so much offer us a career retrospective, but follows the man as he looks rather fish-out-of-water like making the Canadian film "The Railrodder" (1965). It's here that he attempts to rekindle some of the magic that he so successfully brought to silent cinema in the 1920s with the likes of "Sherlock Jr" (1924) and, of course, "The General" (1926). What we do see here is a measure of the man's professionalism and of his creative genius in a medium that even though it has largely outgrown his methods, can still appreciate the adeptness of his comedy timing and simple visuals. "The Railrodder" is more of a travelogue designed to bring tourism to the country, so he spends much of this on a train and chatting to locals as he extols the virtues of the locations he visits - all with a tourist board message. Keaton comes across as an hugely authentic individual. Some of the "stunts" he performs - even at almost seventy years old - can border on the eye watering and for all but an hour we can bask in a little nostalgia with a man who, like many of his generation, struggled to reconcile their outward image with their internal demons.

It's a little wonder, that this rare documentary made its way onto the german television screen. But it happened a few years ago and since then it is one of my taped treasures that I keep in my private collection.

I started to love Keaton films when I was a child, and I still do. "Buster Keaton Rides Again" catches a lot of the wonderful skills of this master of comedy. Along with "Keaton: A Hard Act to Follow" Spottons film is the best way to get to know The Great Stone Face from a more personal side. And, of course, never forget to watch the master pieces Keaton made in the twenties.

The Railrodder is an interesting and funny silent short Keaton made in 1964 in which he travels - rather accidentally - via a tiny motorized rail car from the East coast to the West coast of Canada as part of a Canadian travelogue. Meant to be just one of the various industrial films Keaton starred in late in his career, it turned out to be much more than that. This is because filmmaker John Spotton decided to "film the filming of" the Railrodder and thus make a documentary - "Buster Keaton Rides Again". As a result, we get rare - maybe the only - footage of Keaton at work as he comes up with gags, fights for his ideas when the director thinks a particular stunt is too dangerous, and as he basically co-directs by placing a group of workmen where he thinks they should be in a particular shot. We also get to see Keaton at rest and at play - his passion for bridge and baseball, his shyness around large crowds when he is honored by a town he is passing through, and the adorable relationship he had with his third wife Eleanor as she insists that he lie down and rest after a busy day and his response is "I should sell her".

The short and documentary were shot in the autumn of 1964, just some 16 or so months before Keaton's death in February 1966 from lung cancer. A few of Keaton's coughing fits captured on the documentary are thus somewhat sadly prophetic of what is soon to come. Thus this documentary is essential viewing for any Keaton fan because we get to see him as he was at the end of his life - a happy man who still insisted on putting out the best work he could after 65 years in show business.

After viewing The Railrodder on the National Film Board of Canada site as linked from Mark Evanier's, I then decided to watch this documentary about the making of that on the same sources I just listed. It's a fascinating chronicle of star Buster Keaton's travails during 1964 with his wife Eleanor and the short's director Gerald Potterton in tow. Besides many events that happened to them during the year I mentioned, we also see still photos of Buster's early life and career as well as highlights of what is considered his masterpiece, The General. One of the short's crew also mentions an early neck injury Keaton suffered when water from a tower fell on him but he didn't know it at the time. That happened on Sherlock Jr. which I just watched a few weeks ago at an outside venue. Also fascinating was seeing Buster basically co-directing with Potterton whether dealing with some men running from his railcar or disagreeing about whether to use a gag involving a large piece of paper over a high bridge. We also get to hear him sing something while playing a ukulele. I think I've said enough so I'll just say if you're a die-hard Keaton fan, Buster Keaton Rides Again comes highly recommended.

this is a "National Film Board of Canada" documentary.it chronicles some of the the making of "The Railrodder",a short film that Keaton did late in his career .it also gives some insight into Keaton and his early life.i thought this was a very good documentary.it was well written,humorous and entertaining.it's just under 1 hour,but there is a lot of info in that time.it is a bit sad to watch,as Keaton is clearly in the end stages of his life.in fact,he died the next year(1966).nevertheless, i think the filmmakers did a good job with the film.some of Keaton's Genius is still evident in the film,at least to me.unlike many documentaries,which tend to be drawn out and boring,this 1 is not,at least in my view.if you are a Keaton fan,you might like this documentary.i am,and i give this film 9/10.

I was dissapointed. I had enjoyed watching The Railrodder, and was hoping the documentary would reveal more about Keatons cross Canada adventure, and how the various scenes were filmed. But instead it chose to focus on the time spent in the rail car, or on the various people they met along the way. Unfortunately, none of it is all that interesting.

I love many of the documentaries I've seen over the years from NFB (National Film Board - Canada, for those who don't know).

This one isn't 'about' legendary comedian Buster Keaton, instead, it's a working across the nation (via a train) with Mr Keaton and a crew who were writing with him to film several television promotional pieces.

As we journey, Mr Keaton is tasked with making these bite-sized films - things which are in their modern sense are adverts, but, when he started his career, a silent film could be any length, but the big thing was, as there's no dialogue, you had to be able to grab a viewer's attention - and quickly, and Mr Keaton (aka the 'great stone face, noted for his blank expression as chaos ensured around him.

Though I wasn't around during this time, my father (who wasn't, either) - who loved these films, shared many of them with me when I was little, and I love them.

We get to watch Buster and his crew work out what are simple, yet brilliant simple visual 'stories' some quite dangerous (Mr Keaton is well-known for- amongst other things - standing as the framing from A HOUSE FELL around him (he survived, having worked out where he should be; where the window would go).

Today, no studio would allow their talent to partake in the things Buster did - and DOES. They'd have an understudy - and now, digital (ugh) effects.

This is ALL real, and the fact that Buster - who'd die within less than a year after this (as a reformed smoker, watching Mr Keaton with his ever-present cigarette holder, smoking one after another of lung cancer, I think THAT was truly 'scary' for me), and it's doing all of these gags (in one, he's in a teeny-tiny little hands car HIGH atop a bridge - with NO safety anything. Truly nuts, but all Buster Keaton, and as someone who never got into video games, this film, and those moments are a million times more adrenaline pumping than anything one can play today.

Watch it, learn and be amazed by a true master of mayhem. You'll love it.

A behind the scenes look at the making of one of Buster Keaton's last movies, The RailRodder made by the national film board of Canada as a promotional film. You get to see his process and how he works with the young people making the movie that have nowhere near the level of skill or mastery that he has, even at his advanced age and in ill health. It's a wonderful time capsule that I'm so thankful exists, both in preserving Keaton and a time of Canadian history and culture that is long gone as well. Well worth seeing by anyone, not just Keaton fans. Check out the RailRodder too! This will make you enjoy that even more (and it's already great!)

Sometimes we are lucky. In this case, we have a man who in his prime was an absolute genius, someone who invented many of the ways we think in images. Also, he is solely responsible for one of the mainstays of film humor, extreme physical stretches with dead, dead loneliness. Bill Murray is who carries this today, less well I think.

Anyway we have this guy. Destroyed by drink and serial misdoubts. He is already dying. A dumb, uninteresting man who can only pretend to be his younger self. Our luck is that a second film crew follows him about and we see him "off camera."

The result is a true tragedy, one that really affected me. Why should great men fade? Need they go so low?

In terms of production, this is pretty poor, as many documentaries are. We just take what the camera happens to capture and fill in the missing pieces ourselves.

Ted's Evaluation -- 2 of 3: Has some interesting elements.