The film follows a young "Willie McKay," played by Buster Keaton, as he journeys back to his Appalachian home where he quickly becomes smitten with "Virginia Canfield" (Natalie Talmadge). However, their family names carry significant weight regarding any possibility of a relationship. Similar to the families in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, there's an age-old feud that won't simply disappear because these two have …

It was the bit with the equestrian performer, surprisingly not the action sequences, that convinced me Keaton surpasses Chaplin.