#59 - Cavalcade (1933)

Because I got a bit behind, I had to finish a second movie today in order to catch up.  And thus, through the first two months of the year, I have watched exactly as many movies (59) as there have been days this year.  I'm very pleased with my sticktoitiveness.  Don't bother looking it up.  That's not at all a word. :D

In homage to the wrong decision being made at the Oscars last night (Tom Hooper?!?!) I decided on a movie that is often considered one of the worst ever to win the Best Picture Oscar: 1933's Cavalcade.  As you can tell, I have little expectation for this film.

First of all, something that is clear right from the get-go is the complete range of acting abilities showcased in this movie.  Some of the acting is so bad, it hurts, though the dialogue is largely to blame.  Gems like:

"We have a great marriage."

"Yes, we do."

Yikes.

This is then followed by the obligatory grasp-and-stare so common in older films.  It happens two more times in the next five minutes.  Scary.

The basic premise of the film is that it follows a family through about 30 years of New Years' Days, from 1899 to 1933, through significant world events: The Boer War, WWI, the voyage of the Titanic (this was a really lousy and stupid thing to have included), etc.  I really thought the premise sounded kind of neat, but the movie is far too uneven.  Characters disappear and reappear later and I find that I've forgotten that I cared about them (or didn't care about them).  The matriarch of the family spends most of the movie being morose, and it bothers me to no end.  First: the part is thankless.  Her husband goes off to war, then her son drowns when the Titanic sinks, then her other son is enlisted in the war.  It never ends.  It's a lot like Mrs. Miniver, except not as good, and Greer Garson is a much more solid actress.  (Plus, she's written more heroically than tragically.)

The most consistent parts of the film were definitely the parts where the life of Fanny Bridges, the daughter of an old family friend, intertwines with the Marryotts.  She's quite a good singer and one of the best actors in the film, but also her affiliation with the family feels normal and salient.

And the end of the film has a crappy pat ending where the married couple we've been following shares a drink at the New Year and makes a toast to "the spirit of gallantry", their dead sons, their country, blah blah blah.  It's easy to see why the Academy fell all over it, but it's mediocrity personified in and of itself.

Score: 6/10