The Saphead Reviews

Buster Keaton made his feature-film debut in THE SAPHEAD, an atypical, but amusing, yarn based on an old theatrical warhorse called "The Henrietta," which was previously filmed with Douglas Fairbanks in 1915 as THE LAMB. Bertie Van Alstyne (Buster Keaton), the pampered, milquetoast son of Wall Street tycoon Nicholas Van Alstyne (William H. Crane), is in love with his father's ward, Agnes (Beulah Booker), but Nick won't let Bertie marry her until he gets a job and makes something of himself. Nick's daughter Rose (Carol Holloway) is married to crooked investment broker Mark Turner (Irving Cummings), who works for Nick, and who has secretly fathered a daughter with his long-time mistress Henrietta Reynolds (Helen Holte). When Henrietta gets sick, she writes to Turner to ask for his help, but he ignores her letters. Using his father's money, Bertie buys a seat on the stock exchange for $100,000 and proposes to Agnes. The wedding is to be held at Nick's mansion, but during the ceremony, a girl bursts into the house, claiming to be Henrietta's daughter, and shows Rose her mother's love letters from Turner. Turner, however, denies any wrongdoing, and successfully manages to shift the blame onto the hapless Bertie. Nick goes on a cruise, and puts Turner in charge of his business while he's away. Knowing that the truth about his involvement with Henrietta will eventually come out, Turner tries to quickly cash in, and orders all of Nick's shares of the "Henrietta" mine to be sold off at low prices so that he can buy them back and control Nick's company. On the cruise ship, Nick sees a newspaper headline about his plunging stock caused by a raid on the Henrietta mine. He gets off the ship and returns to New York, but when he arrives, he discovers that Turner has stolen all of his securities, and he is unable to save his company. Meanwhile, Bertie thinks that he's being taunted about the love letters when he hears everyone shouting "Henrietta" on the stock exchange floor. One of Nick's associates tells Bertie that he can get the men to stop saying "her" name by going up to each one of them and saying "I'll take it," which he does, and in the process, inadvertently rescues his father's company. After playing supporting parts in some Fatty Arbuckle comedy shorts, Keaton and producer Joe Schenck signed a contract with Metro for him to star in his own series of two-reelers, but before he began them, Schenck made a deal with the studio for Buster to star in THE SAPHEAD. Douglas Fairbanks himself reportedly suggested Keaton for the part when previous commitments prevented him from playing Bertie "The Lamb." The film itself is not particularly good, being slow, melodramatic, stagy, and contrived, but it is historically fascinating and quite interesting as an example of Keaton's early screen-persona before it evolved into its classic image. At one point, he actually smiles, and the effect is startling, since, of course, his trademark is as "The Great Stoneface." Although he was simply an actor hired to play an established part, and had nothing to do with the writing or direction, Keaton still manages to bring some distinctive comic touches to the part. The scene where Bertie first visits the stock exchange and is the butt of several practical jokes, getting his hat repeatedly knocked off, is an excellent demonstration of his physical gifts. The big climax is also a superb showcase for Keaton's talents, as he frenziedly leaps, slides, and somersaults across the stock exchange floor screaming "I'll take it." Also, the caviar-eating, dimwitted fop character who eventually proves himself through a series of comical misadventures, would serve as a model for several of Keaton's later films, particularly Rollo Treadway in THE NAVIGATOR (1924), Jimmy Shannon in SEVEN CHANCES (1925), and Alfred Butler in THE BATTLING BUTLER (1926).