Buster Keaton's Sherlock Jr.
Type of material: Hardcover as well as softcover Book
Author: edited by Andrew Horton
Publisher: Cambridge University Press (The Edinburgh Building, Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge CB2 2RU)
Year: 1997
Pages:
Price: £30.00 and paperback at £10.95
Review: I have long held that Keaton was superior to Chaplin, and not just because his movies are actually funny, so I'm happy to recommend this collection of essays. Sherlock Jr. is coming to be recognised as one of the greatest film comedies, and equal to Keaton's own The General.
The writers here explore his vaudeville background, his technical virtuosity, the way in which he parodies the figure of the Great Detective... The film-within-the-film is more than a burlesque: it tells us how audiences of the mid-1920s saw the cinematic Sherlock Holmes. Incidentally, I hadn't noticed that Sherlock's 'sharp assistant' is called Gillette - a nod to both William and King Gillette.
Reviewed by: Roger Johnson, [District Messenger 171, 1997]
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