The Cameraman

The Cameraman is a 1928 American silent romantic comedy film directed by Edward Sedgwick and an uncredited Buster Keaton. The picture stars Keaton and Marceline Day. The Cameraman was Keaton's first film with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. It is considered by fans and critics to be Keaton still in top form, and it was added to the National Film Registry in 2005 as being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant." Within a little over a year, however, MGM would take away Keaton's creative control over his pictures, thereby causing drastic and long-lasting harm to his career. Keaton was later to call the move to MGM "the worst mistake of my career." Plot Buster, a sidewalk tintype portrait photographer in New York City, develops a crush on Sally, a secretary who works for MGM Newsreels. To be near her, he purchases an old film camera, emptying his bank account, and attempts to get a job as one of MGM's cameramen. Harold, an MGM cameraman who has designs on Sally himself, mocks his ambition.