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Buster Keaton - The Art of the Gag

Tony Zhou breaks down how Buster Keaton constructed physical comedy with mathematical precision, setting up and paying off gags across an entire shot. A perfect pairing with the Crash Course silent era episode.

Every Frame a Painting · 7 min · Intermediate · HIS · Film History · 2015

What you take away

A great physical gag is built like an equation, with a setup that logically demands its payoff.

Watch it

Filed under

The films of Buster Keaton

The Navigator (1924)

The critics’ canon

Film history

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