The last of Keaton's great silent comedies is not as consistent as "The General" or as ingenious as "Sherlock, Jr.", but it has its moments. Sporting a beret and pencil moustache, the effete milquetoast son of a cranky riverboat captain comes home after many years away. Bill Sr. (Ernest Torrence) is disgusted by his son and labors vainly to make a man of him. Father is also conducting a heated rivalry with another boat owner (Tom McGuire), whose daughter (Marion King) has been good friends with Bill Jr. since school. After Dad gets jailed, a cyclone and flood hit, and Bill Jr. determines to spring his Dad as well as save many of the endangered townspeople. The classic wind storm sequence has a number of eye-popping stunts, including a famous one where the entire wall of a two-story house falls on Keaton with a small window that just clears his body: half his film crew walked off the set and the cameraman hid his eyes after setting up the camera and letting it roll, because Keaton insisted on doing the death-defying stunt.
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The review of this Movie prepared by David Loftus
