"Our Hospitality" was Keaton's second feature film after he went from making two-reel (20 minute) short films to feature films in 1923. It is a comic take-off on the Hatfield and McCoy feud of the 1880's, but here Keaton takes you back to 1830, primarily so he can introduce the main mechanical gag of the film, - a mechanically-accurate faithful re-creation of the early locomotive - Stephenson's Rocket. The train moves so slowly that Keaton's dog runs alongside the train and has no trouble keeping up.
The jist of the story is that Keaton plays Willie McKay, the surviving McKay after the McKay/Canfield feud of roughly twenty years before. Willie travels to his ancestral home in Appalachia to inspect some property he's inherited, and on the journey there begins to fall for the young lady with whom he is traveling, played by his wife Natalie Talmadge. She turns out to be a Canfield, and when her brothers find out that a McKay is in town they go for their guns. However, the patriarch of the family (Big Joe Roberts) warns his sons that it is against their code of hospitality to shoot someone inside of their house. Willie, who has been invited to dinner, learns of all of this and does his best to not leave the house.
It is interesting to see Keaton and his first wife on screen together. This film was shot during the time that they were actually getting along. Highly recommended.
The jist of the story is that Keaton plays Willie McKay, the surviving McKay after the McKay/Canfield feud of roughly twenty years before. Willie travels to his ancestral home in Appalachia to inspect some property he's inherited, and on the journey there begins to fall for the young lady with whom he is traveling, played by his wife Natalie Talmadge. She turns out to be a Canfield, and when her brothers find out that a McKay is in town they go for their guns. However, the patriarch of the family (Big Joe Roberts) warns his sons that it is against their code of hospitality to shoot someone inside of their house. Willie, who has been invited to dinner, learns of all of this and does his best to not leave the house.
It is interesting to see Keaton and his first wife on screen together. This film was shot during the time that they were actually getting along. Highly recommended.