The General

Movie: The General, 1926; 75 min

Director: Buster Keaton and Clyde Bruckman

Actors: Buster Keaton, Marion Mack

Summary:

A train engineer becomes a war hero when in pursuit to save his love, Annabelle. The story follows the man’s train adventures and how he saves the day.

Question 1: What purpose do the minimal subtitles serve?

            This movie was made during the silent film era, so therefore, there had to be the separate subtitle slides in order to tell the story. The slides are separate from the movie and serve the purpose to tell the story through dialogue and narration. Theses subtitles are simple and straightforward. The simplicity of the subtitles allows the movie to be viewed by a larger audience because people will still be able to enjoy the movie even if they do not have a high literacy level. Also, the minimal subtitles allow the story to be told through the action and the actors’ facial expressions. The audience’s attention is drawn away from only focusing on reading the subtitles in order to understand the story, and instead they can focus on the special effects in the movie. This makes the film more entertaining and allows the movie to make more money through a wider audience.

Question 2: Compare and contrast the simple dialogue in The General to the more complex dialogue in Birth of A Nation.

            The straightforward, simple dialogue in The General attracts a wider audience for the film. Even though Birth of A Nation still attracted a large audience because of its racial content, The General was an easier film for the less literate population to follow. With simple dialogue, the story in The General was simple yet still very entertaining. It also draws the focus of the movie to the special effects that were not present in Birth of A Nation, which had a far more complex dialogue. There are points in that film where the dialogue and story line is difficult to follow where the simple storyline of The General left little confusion in the audience. Also, there are more subtitle slides with dialogue and narratives in Birth of A Nation that take away from the movie and make it choppier, where as, in The General, there is minimal interruption for dialogue because it is not necessarily needed. Personally, from a viewer’s perspective, The General was much more entertaining compared to Birth of A Nation mainly because there was little dialogue and more emphasis on the special effects.