Context & Realist vs. Expressive

• Women tend to function in the narratives of the shorts as devices for conflict or Keaton's love interests.
• However, in One Week, Sybil Seely has a much stronger role, she is his equal - as the 2 characters work to build and retain the house together. Still, she reinforces trad. gender roles as she cooks breakfast while Keaton attempts to build the house.
• Keaton also acknowledges the voyeuristic role of the camera in the sequence where Seely takes a bath, his hand appearing to cover the lens as if to protect her modesty. Seely also breaks the fourth wall by smiling at the camera, aware she is being watched.
• Keaton also acknowledges social changes of the time, with the line of "i don't cate how she votes. I'm going to marry her" in Scarecrow - referencing the success of women's suffrage, as most American states had granted women full voting rights by the end of 1919.
• In Cops, Keaton's girlfriend is represented as snobbish and cruel - serving as a plot device, as her rejection of Keaton leads him into a series of mishaps.
• To an extent, the naïve and childlike characters played in silent comedy defy trad. masculine roles - e.g. One Week, where Keaton struggles to conform to these as he is unable to build a home for his wife or cope with the most basic of tasks.
• Keaton's attempts to construct the ideal home in One Week links to Ford Motor Companies documentary that demonstrates how ford workers can build their own affordable, pre-fabricated homes. It undercuts these notions (and expanding consumer culture of the time) as Keaton struggles to build this reportedly easy-assembly home.
• The house in scarecrow was a reference to comic illustrations by Rube Goldberg - he drew characters surrounded by crazy contraptions as a comment on how devices can often confuse and complicate rather than facilitate our lives.
• Keaton also references cubism for comedic affect - e.g. in One Week, the house takes on a cubist form, resembling an abstract angular face, with the roof as a tiny hate while the pickets on the front porch resemble large teeth.
• Keaton uses surrealism style for comical purposes - like the over-sized newspaper gag in High Sign deifies the norms of the real world, appearing to open like a magic trick.
• The use of outdoor locations and natural lighting are in the realist mode (in recognisable locations, such as the streets of L.A or the fairground) , while the surreal gags and elaborate sets are more expressionistic and surrealist.