Screenplay:
Buster KeatonCinematography:
Elgin LessleyCast:
Buster Keaton, Wallace Beery, Joe Roberts, Lionel Belmore, George Davis, Louise Emmons, Kewpie MorganVOD (1)
Plots(1)
A brilliant historical satire teeming with inventive flourishes, Buster Keaton’s Three Ages is a silent comedy of truly epic proportions. Keaton’s first feature is a clever parody of D. W. Griffith’s Intolerance that follows Buster’s hard-luck romantic adventures throughout world history: from the dawn of man in the Stone Age, through the gladiatorial arenas of ancient Rome, to the city streets of Jazz Age America. By flavoring the ancient stories with bits of modern comedy (e.g. the “spare tire” with which Buster repairs his chariot and the “home run” that he scores against an angry caveman), Keaton not only won raucous laughter from the audience but forged an original approach to history, humor, and cinema that clearly foreshadowed the Mel Brooks and Monty Python films that followed half a century later. (Criterion)
(more)Cast
Buster Keaton
USA
Best movies:
The General (1926)
Sunset Boulevard (1950)
Limelight (1952)
Wallace Beery
USA
Best movies:
Beggars of Life (1928)
Behind the Door (1919)
Robin Hood (1922)
Joe Roberts
USA
Best movies:
Our Hospitality (1923)
Three Ages (1923)
Lionel Belmore
UK
Best movies:
The Last of the Mohicans (1936)
If I Were King (1938)
Three Ages (1923)
George Davis
Netherlands
Best movies:
Song of Love (1947)
He Who Gets Slapped (1924)
The Circus (1928)
Louise Emmons
USA
Best movies:
West of Zanzibar (1928)
Robin Hood (1922)
King Kong (1933)
Kewpie Morgan
USA
Best movies:
Beggars of Life (1928)
After the Thin Man (1936)
Three Ages (1923)