During America’s Civil War Union spies steal engineer Johnnie Gray's (Buster Keaton's) beloved locomotive The General and he single-handedly must do all in his power to get it back. Released throughout most of the world in 1927, this Silent comedy-action film flopped when originally released, but now is regarded as one of the great American motion pictures. The story is based on actual historic events.
A lone prospector ventures into Alaska looking for gold. He gets mixed up with some burly characters and falls in love with the beautiful Georgia. He tries to win her heart with his singular charm.
In order to impress the father of a girl he is keen on, Buster goes to the city in search of work. In his letters home he writes of his various jobs which her imagination expands into much nobler ones than those that he is actually attempting.
An impecunious customer creates chaos in a department store while the manager and his assistant plot to steal the money kept in the establishment's safe.
Buster clowns around in a blacksmith's shop until he and the smithy get in a fight which sends the smithy to jail. Buster helps several customers with horses, then destroys a Rolls Royce while fixing the car parked next to it.