Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in Chicago, plus articles, trailers and more

 

The Cameraman (1928)

Director: Edward Sedgwick

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Keaton's first feature after moving to MGM. That this meant the eventual sacrifice of his career can be seen in the story - Keaton becomes an MGM newsreel camera-man in order to get the girl, who works in the MGM office - and the first half of the film, a series of gags (collapsing bed, reflex-testing, mixed-up bathing suits) second-hand enough to have come out of Nickelodeon. But the final sequences make up for this disappointment: Keaton gets involved in a Tong war and (inadvertently) with an organ-grinder's monkey. He shoots exclusive footage, but the monkey steals the film. Keaton returns with an empty camera and is kicked out. Gloomily he goes to the beach. His girl is in a boating accident. Forsaking his camera, he rescues her. The monkey keeps the camera rolling. Keaton gets the girl, and back at MGM, it's the greatest news film they've ever seen...shot by the monkey. A delightful piece of film-making within-a-film which is both an insight into Keaton's own logic, and also, alas, a sort of epitaph.

Author: AN

Time Out Film Guide


What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields





Features

Do overs!

Do overs!

After Race to Witch Mountain, what should Disney remake next?

Gray's anatomy

James Gray wants to push buttons—again.

The next big thing?

Gigantic Releasing tries to rethink indie distribution…without movie theaters.

Red Diva: Lyubov Orlova, First Lady of Soviet Cinema

So you think you can dance, comrade?

Puppet master

Coraline director Henry Selick takes stop-motion animation into 3-D.

Socratic method

Laurent Cantet's approach on the set matches the message of his film.

Wander woman

Kelly Reichardt's Wendy and Lucy puts a Bush-era spin on the road movie.

Oscars

Read our interviews with the nominees, our reviews of the nominated films and more.