Top Five Gags: The High Sign

April 18^th, 2021 – the day The High Sign was released. As I’ve said before, this was the first independent short Buster Keaton made but not the first one he released. He ultimately held this one back until after he’d put out a few stronger, tighter shorts, and as such, The High Sign is experimental and a little messy compared to something like One Week or Neighbors. However, it still reflects Buster’s panache and potential as he stepped out on his own in his films (spoilers.)

 

The Newspaper

This is a classic. Very simple on the face of it – Buster continues to unfold a newspaper as it reaches comically-large proportions until it’s the size of a bedsheet and he topples over as he gets lost inside it – but executed so well. Each beat is perfect as the gag builds, and I especially like Buster having to get up on top of the bench as the newspaper gets too big to handle.

 

Rigging the Bell

Clever Buster. Trying to get a job at a shooting gallery, he has to pass himself off as a crack shot. There’s a bell that rings every time he gets a hit, so naturally, Buster rigs up an elaborate system involving a small dog tied to the bell who gets baited to chase after a meaty bone every time Buster presses a hidden pedal (only Buster, I swear.) The result? A bullseye “ding!” every time! This leads Buster to increasingly-more elaborate trick shots, knowing that, even when he accidentally fires at the ceiling, he can still smash the pedal to make it sound like he got a hit. Trademark mechanical gag, with bonus points for including a live animal in his contraption.

 

Introduction to the Blinking Buzzards

A little moment, but I love it. The gallery owner, having seen Buster’s “expert shooting,” decides to induct him into the Blinking Buzzards gang. While he’s yammering, Buster slips around behind him and through the door, so when the guy finally gets around to opening the door himself, Buster’s already standing on the other side waiting for him, hands on his hips with a “come on already!” attitude. It’s just delightful. 

 

Evading the Police Officer

I do love me a good clever-but-half-thought-out Buster disguise. After getting on the bad side of a cop (as always,) Buster does some quick thinking, turning his collar around and putting his jacket on backwards in a pretty good DIY parson disguise. Unfortunately for him, it only works from the front, and as soon as the cop walks past and then looks back at him, it’s clear he’s just a guy with his jacket on backwards.

 

Hanging His Hat

Another good tiny moment, just Buster shaking hands with the Nickelnursers as he casually tosses his hat onto the hat stand across the room without looking. Throwaway bits like this do such a nice job displaying those strong flashes of Buster’s personality, and they add so much to a scene like this, which is more functional and not as outwardly comedic.

The High Sign (1921)

I’ve decided that it’d be nice to go back and do fuller reviews of some Buster Keaton projects that I previously covered as parts of a set, like Top Five posts or write-ups on his TV work.  At the very least, his independent shorts provide plenty of fodder for discussion.

A down-on-his-luck Buster cons his way into a job at a shooting gallery, where his fancy trick shooting (literally “trick” shooting – it’s all fake) earns him two brand-new, diametrically-opposed occupations.  He’s initiated into the notorious gang the Blinking Buzzards, where he’s tasked with assassinating a wealthy man:  the same man who’s just hired him as his bodyguard.  Since Buster is 1) not really the murdering type, and 2) smitten with the man’s daughter (because, duh,) he sets his protect his mark like no assassin has before.

The High Sign is the first short Buster made on his own, though it’s not the first he released; he didn’t think it was up-to-snuff as a first impression for himself as an independent filmmaker, so he held back its release until after he made One Week.  I’d say that was the right choice.  While this short is fun, it’s slightly messy, and not the instant classic that One Week is. 

In some ways, Buster is still finding his footing here.  The film leans more heavily on elements that don’t feature prominently in much of his work.  For instance, some of the intertitles feel a little self-consciously overwritten, like the alliteration-laden intro to the Blinking Buzzards.  Other jokes, though, are more in line with Buster’s sensibilities – “tight as a fourteen collar on a sixteen neck” is a terrific description of a miser.  The High Sign also uses lots of “cartoon gags,” literally impossible bits of business thrown in just for the joke.  People can be hit-or-miss on the more cartoonish stuff, but while they can seem a bit out-of-place, they still mostly work here.  Buster painting a hook on the wall and then hanging his hat on it is an iconic moment. 

There are also places where the gags don’t build as organically as they should.  It’s fine to take comedic detours, but they need to feel like they follow one another.  In this short, there’s an amusing enough little tangent of Buster helping customers at the shooting gallery that, while fun, would have been much better placed before he joins the Blinking Buzzards.  Once he’s been given his orders, the plot really should be heading in the general direction of August’s house – it feels like we lose momentum a bit.

This is all pretty nitpicky, but I do like the short.  It has a ton of great gags in it.  The newspaper gag is a classic, and several of Buster’s go-to devices all already on display and in fine form.  There are a few fantastic circular gags that come back around on themselves, the dog-powered(!) contraption Buster rigs up to trick people into thinking he’s a crack shot is pure Buster, and you just know he had a blast designing (and then running, jumping, and climbing through) all the trapdoors/revolving panels/secret exits at August’s house.  We get a nice early cop gag, featuring a fantastic off-the-cuff disguise – oh, Buster.  Plus, just for fun, there’s a brief cameo from Al St. John, part of the Fatty Arbuckle crowd.

Warnings

Slapstick violence and a bunch of light gunplay.