The General Movie Download

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When Union spies steal an engineer's beloved locomotive, he pursues it single-handedly and straight through enemy lines.
Johnnie Gray has two loves in his life: his engine and his girl, Annabelle Lee. The War Between the States begins with an attack on Fort Sumter, and Johnnie is the first in line at the recruitment office. But the enlisting officer rejects him (not telling him the reason: he is more valuable to the South as an engineer). Annabelle believes he didn't even try to enlist, and she refuses to even speak to him until he is in uniform. Time passes and Union spies hatch a plot involving Johnnie's engine, The General. Not only do they steal The General while Johnnie and the passengers are off the train having dinner, but they kidnap Annabelle who was still on board. Johnnie pursues The General in another engine, The Texas. Through various mishaps he becomes the Unionists' sole pursuer. When the Unionists discover the train chasing them has only one man aboard, the long pursuit ends, and Johnnie barely escapes with his life. Johnnie is now behind enemy lines. He wanders the forest during a rainstorm then discovers a house, which he breaks into, grabbing what food he can. It turns out the Unionists who stole The General are using the house as a base of operations. While hiding under the dinner table, Johnnie learns the details of their next plot against the Confederates. More importantly, he discovers they have Annabelle Lee, whom he had never guessed was still on The General when it was taken. Johnnie manages to escape with Annabelle and take back The General. Now the Unionists are pursuing Johnnie, but if he and Annabelle can outrace them they can warn the Confederates of the Union's latest plan.
Fort Sumter has been fired upon, the Civil War has begun. All of the able bodied men of the South have rushed to defend the new flag of the stars and bars. But one man a railroad engineer taking his beloved engine, The General, every day on its run gets rejected for military service. Bad enough he's an outcast among the southern gallants, but his dear sweetheart Marion Mack has said she cannot love a man not in Confederate gray no matter the reason. So poor Buster Keaton goes back to The General and for the next year or so toils at his job while the war rages on. But a plan hatched by some Yankee spies brings Keaton right into the action. The northerners plan to steal a train and run it right up to their lines and wreck all the military contraband they can find. The definition of contraband is a rather broad one as we well know. But those lowdown dirty Yankees made a big mistake in stealing Buster's train. Undaunted he pursues and rescues Marion who was a passenger and the two of them set off in their own train doing all they can to foil the Yankees until the Confederate army can deal with them. The bulk of the film is a laugh filled riot where at various intervals, Buster is the pursuer and the pursued. I have a slightly different take on The General. Although I bow to Keaton's comic genius and the film after the trains start rolling moves at the pace of an Indiana Jones feature, the real marvel as far as I'm concerned is the creative use of special effects. Although Keaton did a lot of his own stunts in The General, the creative use of what have to be miniatures is something to behold. Otherwise a whole lot of railroad property would have been totaled for the making of The General. Best gag in the film is Keaton trying to use that cannon which he attaches to a flatcar on his train. Kind of hard to both steer the train and aim the cannon as he found out. Next best gag in the film is at the final battle where he deals with a Union sniper in a most interesting manner. The General is silent screen comedy at its very best. No better authority than Keaton's rival Charlie Chaplin said so. Who am I to argue?
I've been a fan of Keaton for just over a year now, but only today did i get around to watching the general. I'd heard so much about it and worried it wouldn't live upto the hype or the humour wouldn't translate. or i worried it would be the best i'll ever see and i should save it for a special occasion; today i finished my exams, special enough in my books. It is a brilliant film. not the high gag rate i was expecting if i am honest but this really is a case of quality over quantity. and the jokes are also very subtle (many are, anyway). i get the feeling multiple viewings will yield more and more laughs. Keaton's everyman characters tries to get back his train, and innocently in the process gets the girl and stops an enemy attack. it's very feel-good and also hilarious. I think my favourite scenes are on the train with Keaton and his Girl where she keeps doing things wrong, or they have miniature arguments- there's something inherently hilarious about a) in the midst of all the fighting etc, Keaton's girl picking up a broom and starting to sweep his train and b) Keaton's reaction of anger, turning to just a passionate hug. it's just done very beautifully basically, this is a great film- please, Keatonites, don't put it off, as i did, it's worth viewing now. and again, and again. also, i'm a sucker for happy endings- so that's nice

The following FAQ entries may contain spoilers. Only the biggest ones (if any) will be covered with spoiler tags. Spoiler tags are used sparingly in order to make the page more readable. They're his fan club, of sorts. A train engineer was very likely to attract admiration from young boys. Also, they serve a dramatic function: they show the fundamental decency of Johnnie (<a href="/name/nm0000036/">Buster Keaton</a>), who doesn't just tell them to get lost when he's trying to court his girl. The scene also shows Johnnie's cleverness as he contrives a gentler way to get rid of them. Buster, dejected over losing his girl, sits on his train's connecting rod. The train starts moving. Buster, deep in reverie, doesn't notice. He snaps out of it and looks around frantically just as the train passes into the enginehouse. This was a risky stunt. If the wheels had slipped, he'd have been thrown. The train crash cost came to $42,000 ($1.7 million at 1995 price levels), making it the most expensive single shot in all of silent films. That figure did not include disposal of the wreckage. Not until World War II would the Texas's rusty carcass be salvaged for scrap metal. a5c7b9f00b

The General Movie Download

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