Fact | History | News on Instagram: "One of the most expensive single shots in silent film history came from Buster Keaton's 1926 masterpiece, The General. In a legendary scene, an actual locomotive crashes through a burning bridge into a river below—no miniatures, no special effects. The cost of orchestrating and filming this moment was an astonishing $42,000 at the time, equivalent to over $700,000 today when adjusted for inflation. Keaton’s decision to use a real train was both a bold creativ