bsmith5552 "The Navigator" is essentially a two character film. Buster Keaton plays an heir to the "Treadway fortune", Rollo Treadway. It's a part similar to the one he played in his first feature, "The Saphead" (1920). Kathryn McGuire plays Betsy O'Brien the daughter of a rich shipbuilder.There are two unnamed countries at war. One of them purchase a large luxury liner, "The Navigator" from Betsy's father. The other side plots to capture the ship and set her adrift so that she will be dashed upon the rocks and sink.When Betsy rejects Rollo's marriage proposal, he decides to take the planned honeymoon cruise to Hawaii himself. Naturally Rollo boards the wrong ship, the deserted Navigator. Betsy meanwhile in trying to rescue her father, who has been captured by spies, winds up aboard the Navigator unbeknownst to Rollo. Being on such a large ship the two manage to avoid running into each other with comedic effect.The two being rich and spoiled are at first unable to live on their own. But as the voyage proceeds, Rollo manages to devise a series of pulleys and equipment that solves their feeding problems. Rollo has to don a deep sea diving outfit in order to repair a broken rudder on the ship. Just as they are about to accept their fate they spot land. The only problem is the island is inhabited by cannibals.Turning Buster Keaton loose on an empty ocean liner you know will result in an endless array of pratfalls and sight gags...and it does. The fighting off of the cannibal attack is a highlight. His rescue of Betsy from the cannibals and their return to the ship is hilarious. His diving sequence where he puts up a "Danger - Men at Work" sign, uses a lobster to cut a cord and his "swordfight" with a pair of swordfish are memorable. In one scene, Buster gets entangled with a cannon which he would utilize again in "The General" (1926). The pair's rescue when all is seemingly lost during the relentless cannibal attack is pure Keaton.Not to be missed, a true Keaton classic.

Martin Bradley Perfection and one of the greatest comedies ever made. Is "The Navigator" the best of Keaton, (he co-directed it with Donald Crisp)? Impossible to say since there are so many masterpieces. This is the one in which he is adrift on an ocean liner with the girl he hopes to marry. It's short, much too short; at under one hour it hardly qualifies as a feature but it has some of the best visual gags in all of cinema while Keaton's performance is, of course, nothing short of sublime. The climatic sequences involving a tribe of cannibals may hardly seem very PC these days but we must remember when the film was made. At least there are no Stepin Fetchit butlers in this one.

secondtake The Navigator (1924)This short fun silent comedy is filled with gags and funny moments, but it's not Buster Keaton's best (in my view) being a little obvious and kind of more silly than original. It also has a grand climax that plays on stereotypes of naive and impressionable natives on some faraway island and it struck me as dated and (depending on the viewer, maybe) demeaning. This includes a comic appearance of Keaton in a deep sea suit from the water spooking the natives who apparently think he is a kind of monster or god. They later catch on and the chase begins again.The basis of the movie is the clueless rich young man (Keaton) trying to get the disinterested girl (Betsy O'Brien). And in a very very roundabout way he seems like he just might. You'll see.The Navigator is actually the name of a ship (a trick rather like how the name of his better and more famous film "The General" is the really the name of a locomotive). And it mostly takes place on board this abandoned vessel (which Keaton bought outright when it was being scrapped). The reason it is abandoned (in the movie) and set adrift seems like it might matter at first as a kind of political plot but this all ends up not really being part of the larger movie. It's just an excuse to have the two on a big ship alone, with all the likely things that might happen as a result.The grand finale of it all is a bit of a lucky farce, and a good laugh, though the natives, again, don't look too clever in it all. The gags that Keaton uses are slapstick and sight gags, with some of his trademark stunt work but not as much as usual. In fact, this might the most Chaplin-esque of all his films, even having a scene where submarine tilts its sense of "level" and reminds me a lot of Chaplin's "Gold Rush" in the cabin scenes. To note, however, this is one year before the Chaplin film. The scenes where Keaton is at his best are probably the underwater ones, with a lobster as a wire cutter and a sword fish as a weapon in an underwater sword fight. Hilarious.Keaton co-directs with Donald Crisp, who went on to a long acting career (starting years before "Birth of a Nation" and going into the 1940s with some general fame). It's thought that Keaton ended up directing most of it himself. It's a great fun ride, for sure, but just if you've seen other Keaton gems ("Sherlock Jr." and "The General" and "Steamboat Bill") you need to expect something less original.

rparkercody I thought the whole set up and layout of the plot was very clever and engaging. I liked how early on, even though it is very simplistic, the audience can relate to the main character and become engaged in the story and the spectacle that much quicker. I also liked all the gags that were done, they were also very clever and well put together, I stood in awe at the fact that there was not only an underwater sequence but an important underwater sequence that was incredible to watch. There are not any characters that we are around so that leads to the few that we see to be very strong and not flat or clichéd and there relationship grows as the peril of the plot grows, it is very engaging.Overall I'd say the pacing was very well done, though I found myself daydreaming once or twice, and technically very well put together. Bravo.