Synopsis
Spite Marriage (1929) is available to watch online on iFILM — Buster Keaton's final silent feature, co-directed with Edward Sedgwick at MGM. Keaton plays Elmer, a mild-mannered dry cleaner who borrows a tuxedo and turns up to every performance of a stage actress named Trilby Drew, hopelessly devoted and completely invisible to her.
When Trilby's leading man gets engaged to someone else, she marries Elmer on impulse — assuming he's a wealthy admirer. He isn't. The film runs on that gap: Elmer trying to make a real marriage out of a joke one, while Trilby waits for her original plan to pay off. Keaton's physical timing carries the whole thing, especially a long sequence of getting a drunk woman into bed that plays out as pure wordless geometry.
Stream Spite Marriage (1929) online on iFILM.
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