GurlyIamBeach Instant Favorite.

Arianna Moses Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Allison Davies The film never slows down or bores, plunging from one harrowing sequence to the next.

Brenda The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one

Djayesse In New York, Buster (Keaton) is a public photographer. You can get your picture taken for ten cents. While he is taking a picture, a big parade takes place: many people gather and among them, Sally (Marceline Day) a young woman who works for the News department at the MGM. The crowd is so big that he is pressed against her, smelling her perfume... After the crowd disappears, he offers to take her picture. She agrees but has to go leaving him with her photograph. When he visits her at work, he decides to be a cameraman... Then he will be able to see her anytime! But you do not become a cameraman just like that: you have to learn how to do it. First, it is an expensive job: he has to buy a camera. Even if he gets the cheapest one, he has not got any money left. Then you have to move the handle the right way: this gives a sequence where you can images moving forwards and backwards, an overprinted ship in a street, and a sequence where the picture is multiplied. A very surrealistic movie which does not please the MGM News director. But Sally still encourages him to go on. She even accepts a date with him. But things do not work as expected. Still, she gives him a last chance : go and film the Chinese New Year. You can guess how it will end... This film is Keaton's penultimate movie. The talkies are coming: The Jazz Singer was released by the Warner Bros Company. This is Keaton's swan song. There is much melancholy, and even sadness in this story. Everything falls apart. Anything he tries is a failure. Even when he wants to end it all and go back to tintypes (he sends his last film to the studio) : instead of being mocked, he is hired! Nevertheless, this film contains great scenes: the stairs, the swimming-pool, the Tong war... Moreover, Keaton teaches us a great reporting lesson: he show us how things work behind the scene. He even rearranges the fights during the Tong war (nobody does that...), but still close to the fighters, risking his own life! As I said earlier, it is his swan song. Kea ton will be less and less important in the film industry. And the last sequence has something prophetic in it: the film ends where it started, with a big parade which he thinks has been organized for him! But this was the day Lindbergh was celebrated after he crossed the Atlantic Ocean. His next movie will be Spite Marriage. Sadness and melancholy will be stronger. Meanwhile, let us enjoy this movie as it is: a very fine comedy, one of Keaton's best. So, enjoy!

Christopher Reid There's so much creativity in this film. It's amazing to remember that this was made before maybe 99.9% of everything else (movies and TV) I've ever seen. There are stunts I've never seen before and lots of innovative shots and sequences.There's a powerful truth and subtlety to Buster Keaton's performances. It's not fake or forced or exaggerated, he doesn't even seem to be trying for laughs. His character isn't stupid but is often oblivious - he accidentally bumps things, misses details, gets things mixed up. Perhaps he's clumsy because he's so indifferent. He isn't careful because not many things matter much to him and he doesn't get hurt easily. But when he's set on achieving something, he does crazy, impressive, imaginative things and is seems almost unstoppable.Buster executes his stunts and physical comedy perfectly and yet it still all looks natural and accidental as if his character didn't mean it at all. That takes a huge amount of skill. He stays in character the whole time. And then his reaction afterwards is almost always mild. It doesn't need to be more, it's the concept that is hilarious. In spite of his efforts to learn from mistakes and avoid trouble, things always seem to go wrong. We've all had experiences like this so it's funny to see his confusion and frustration as he tries to figure out what's going on.His comedy isn't so much about anticipation as execution. We're not sure what's going to happen in a situation and often it's simpler and more primitive that what we might've guessed. But when it happens, it's always timed so well and looks incredibly graceful and comical. We're amazed and surprised while Buster just shrugs and moves on.The monkey is really cool, he must have been trained pretty well. The way he interacts with Buster is cute and awesome.The Cameraman is also fairly romantic. Buster falls in love and you see it in his eyes and posture. He goes into a daze. It's a simple and innocent thing that happens. The girl becomes all that matters to him and he does many things for her without asking anything in return. He sees her walking away with another man at one point and humbly accepts his fate. He may be the great stone face but he uses his body like few others so his emotional expression is not really limited at all. And of course his eyes express a lot. It's about mastery - he chooses to restrain his facial expressions and gestures but he has great control over what he *does* do, which is what matters.With modern comedies you hope for decent writing and acting and maybe a few big laughs. In a really good comedy, you might even get one or two pretty original moments. With Buster, you get a movie full of original ideas performed by a hard-working perfectionist. Buster's like a gymnast, a veritable comedy ninja.

Edgar Allan Pooh . . . a decade before MGM got all uppity from GONE WITH THE WIND (which I always suspected was mostly filmed by junior members of the primate family, who probably also wrote the script for GWTW's mendacious opening scroll). As the title character of THE CAMERAMAN, Buster Keaton was hired to represent the average Tinsel Town filmmaker. He's a constant bumbler in this role, breaking MGM's stenciled glass door panel six times with his camera tripod. On one of his rare excursions outside, Keaton blindsides and knocks unconscious an organ grinder's Capuchin monkey. As soon as the abandoned midget primate regains consciousness, he commandeers Keaton's camera and shoots the "best footage" MGM's boss has "seen in years," despite being woozy and saddled with the most antique camera the city has to offer. Naturally, Specism prompts the MGM mogul to assume Keaton deserves all the credit, and the REAL cameraman finishes his big day out as an unsung (and unemployed) hero. Obviously, it turns out that THE COVE and BLACKFISH were not the first flicks to document mammal abuse!

Michael Neumann Buster Keaton's last great silent film (it was followed by the less memorable 'Spite Marriage') can almost be seen as a textbook lesson on the effects of artistic compromise. After relinquishing his independence to the MGM assembly line Keaton fought hard to maintain at least a semblance of his own peculiar comic integrity, and in that regard the film represents a minor (and short lived) triumph of comedy over bureaucracy.Most of the over-plotted studio script was discarded early in the production, leaving only the necessary framework of a simple story about a hapless tintype portrait seller trying to scoop the latest newsreel headline and win the affection of the girl he loves. That was all the plot Keaton needed to improvise a number of classic routines: the solo ballgame in a deserted Yankee Stadium, an awkward encounter in a crowded poolside changing stall, and a literally riotous Tong war in New York City's Chinatown. As usual Buster is able to overcome every obstacle, by happenstance, luck and divine (actually simian) intervention (it's little Josephine, the organ-grinder monkey, who actually saves the day: one of the few touches of classic Keaton irony in the film).But the erosion of his unique talent is already apparent in the upbeat normality of the scenario and characters, something the comedian casually avoided in his earlier features. The modern, big city setting was an indication of the changes soon to be introduced by sound technology; Harold Lloyd went urban in his final silent feature, 'Speedy', and Chaplin did likewise in 'City Lights' and 'Modern Times'. But, at least for the time being, the best way to win the girl remained the age-old comic combination of ineptitude and heroism.