Three Ages

The same shy suitor chases the same girl through the Stone Age, ancient Rome, and modern 1923 — and loses with identical dignity every time. Buster Keaton’s first feature, co-directed with Edward F. Cline, is a comic answer to D.W. Griffith’s Intolerance: three epochs, one gag logic, intercut so a clubbing, a chariot, and a Ford all rhyme. Wallace Beery is the hulking rival in every century; Margaret Leahy is the prize. Keaton, already a short-subject king, tests whether his stone face and perfect falls can carry six reels — they can. Shot so the three stories could have been released separately if the feature failed, it instead announced that the Great Stone Face was ready for the long form.