Plot Details: This opinion reveals major details about the movie's plot.

There are so many reasons to hate Chris O'Donnell (professionally speaking). He's obviously a smart young actor, since his modis operandi has been destroying otherwise sturdy vehicles — Men Don't Leave, School Ties, Blue Sky, or Circle of Friends. Plus, his arrival signaled the death of the Batman franchise. And lots of people really love Scent of a Woman despite its being the biggest pile of tripe made in decades. But that's not why I'm here complaining about O'Donnell. I'm here because many people who see Buster Keaton's Seven Chances now associate the plot with a 1999 O'Donnell bomb, The Bachelor (not to be confused with modern television's slut-fest of the same name). And that's just wrong on so many levels. Simply put, Chris O'Donnell should be permanently prevented from tampering with classics, while all of the sad people who paid good money to see The Bachelor should be forced to sit down and watch Seven Chances just to see what the real thing looks like.

And that goes for anybody who didn't see The Bachelor as well. Seven Chances is one of Keaton's finest efforts, evolving from character humor to small gags to a masterful conclusion.

As is generally the case in Keaton's films, Seven Chances takes its time establishing its central character and his central dilemma, setting up an empathy that makes the subsequent stunts all the funnier.

Keaton plays Jimmie Shannon, junior partner in a struggling brokerage. On the verge of bankruptcy, Shannon needs money. But on the personal front he's struggling as well. Shannon has been in love with Mary Jones (Ruth Dwyer) for years, but he's incapable of expressing his love. This makes sense, since Keaton's in his traditional buttoned-down sour (or melancholy) mode. Then, opportunity presents itself! A lawyer (Snitz Edwards, whose rumpled face is a sight gag on its own) shows up and tells Jimmie that he stands to inherit 7 million dollars from a rich uncle if he is married by 7 p.m. on his 27th birthday. Easy as pie, right? Except that that day just happens to be Jimmie's 27th birthday. With money serving as the perfect impetus, Jimmie goes to Mary and proposes marriage, but his delivery needs some work. He observes that since he has to marry *somebody*, she may as well be the one. Ooops.

So his first choice out of the way, can Jimmie find some lucky woman to make him an honest man and make him a millionaire? Or, put better, if Jimmie's friends get a story about his plight on the front page of the local papers, will Jimmy be able to avoid the legions of women who want a piece of him?

[Jimmie Shannon may be wandering around town searching for a woman who will take his name, but the historical period imposes certain eligibility restrictions. After all, what's wrong with the woman at the bus stop except that she's reading a Hebrew newspaper? And check out how quickly Jimmie flees when he realizes he's accidentally proposed to a black woman! And the expression on his face when he proposes to a drag queen? Hi-larious!]

Based on a play by David Belasco and directed by Keaton, Seven Chances doesn't run long (only 56 minutes), but it takes the time to establish the character of Jimmie Shannon and his conflicting crises. He wants money and he wants love, but when the opportunity to get both arrives, his social awkwardness outweighs his economic prospects and he makes a botch of things. That's why, once he opens the floodgates (by proposing to a long series of women at the local country club) and the women start swarming on him, the audience can appreciate his horror. For some men, being the most popular bachelor in town would be a turn-on and they'd enjoy having the pick of the litter. But Buster Keaton? He's so scared on the woman he loves, think of what a feeding frenzy would do to him?

That's why the comedy organically justifies the film's escalation. It's Jimmie Shannon's greatest nightmare spiraling out of control!

It starts with character stuff — Keaton alone on a park bench practicing his proposal style... to himself. Then they build to little gags like the woman with the Jewish newspaper. Then Jimmie, on a tight schedule, can't find a clock that tells the proper time, even entering a watch shop full of broken time pieces. Then we move to elaborate, large-scale visual jokes, like Keaton walking in the middle of a deserted street only to suddenly find himself followed by a flood of women already attired in bridal finery. This latter image may be one of the greatest comic images ever put on celluloid as suddenly Keaton's face registers the knowledge that as nice as it would be to have 7 million dollars, marriage can only equal peril.

And so begins the chase that takes up the final fifteen to twenty minutes of Seven Chances. It's a fantastic conclusion and every time you think the stunts and gags have reached their peak, Keaton finds another gear, whether he's dangling from a crane's hook, or running down a hill evading countless boulders (Spielberg clearly owes a debt of gratitude from his Raiders of the Lost Ark thievery).

Keaton's camerawork perfectly mirrors the growing excitement of the film. In the opening sequences there's a marked lack of camera mobility. The first time Buster hops in an automobile, Keaton shows his journey only with a fade from one location to another. But as things become more frenzied, the camera becomes part of the chase, both fleeing *with* Jimmie Shannon and running after him. Keaton also frequently accelerates the film stock in almost imperceptible ways to better represent Shannon's quickly churning limbs.

Like the best of silent comedy and the best of Keaton's films, there's a heavy emphasis on modes of transportation, leaving Keaton to figure out how to best show the speed of modernity — streetcars, trains, and several makes of automobiles make appearances and become vehicles for camera movement. Just a couple years later, the advent of sound would make this kind of physical comedy technically impossible for several years, helping end the careers of Keaton and Harold Lloyd (Chaplin would last a little longer) and helping to open the door to the verbal comic stylings of Ernst Lubitsch and Preston Sturges. I'm not making a value judgement, merely stating that the heavy equipment required for sound recording prevented (again, only for a few years) the frenetic comedy that Keaton and co. helped pioneer. Fortunately, Keaton still had masterpieces like The General and minor masterpieces like College (a slightly inferior version of Lloyd's The Freshman) ahead of him.

The key with Seven Chances is to be patient with the slow build of comedy. In the first few scenes you may only be smiling. Then you may only be chuckling. But the final minutes of pure laughter are priceless...

******
DVD NOTES:
In addition to a stunningly good transfer of the film itself, the Kino DVD of Seven Chances also includes two two-reel comedies that Keaton starred in and also wrote with Eddie Cline.

In The Neighbors, Keaton and his attractive neighbor pass love notes through holes in a fence because of their disapproving families. But even once the couple gets together, their union and upcoming marriage cause even more problems. Keaton swings from clotheslines by his toes, wiggles with his head in the ground like a human carrot, and has a hilarious inability to keep his pants up. The Neighbors also features racial attitudes that are beyond troubling. Like a number of Keaton productions, the hero ends up in black face, only this time he escapes in time to wash his face, leading to the arrest of an innocent African-American passing by. When Keaton is caught again and *again* ends up in black-face, he somehow manages to clean half his face and enters into a routine of being half-white (dignified and controlled) and half-black (he dances a jig). So I'm not sure exactly what to make of this one.

In The Balloonatic, Keaton's problems at a county fair begin in the haunted house, continue to a black eye in the Tunnel of Love, and finally reach a peak when he finds himself on top of a hot air balloon run amuck, producing aerial hijinks. But even once he crash lands, his troubles continue with rapids, a bear, and a shoddy canoe. Funny stuff.

Recommended: Yes

Viewing Format: DVD