A cavalcade of English life from New Year's Eve 1899 until 1933 seen through the eyes of well-to-do Londoners Jane and Robert Marryot. Amongst events touching their family are the Boer War, the death of Queen Victoria, the sinking of the Titanic and the Great War.
The film was one of the first to use the words "damn" and "hell", as in "Hell of a lot". These had been used in the play. There was concern at the Hays Office that this could set a precedent. Fox president Sidney Kent was quoted saying the mild profanity "could not offend any person; and, after all, that was the real purpose of the Code. And as far as the use creating a precedent which might be followed by other producers is concerned, the best answer would be that anyone who could make a picture as good as Cavalcade might be justified in following the precedent." Some of the early Best Picture winners are really duds in retrospect. Looking back now (2016) they are bland, or aged poorly, or are sometimes musicals that just no longer impress. "Cavalcade" is a rare exception in that it seems like it has not aged one bit. The years go by, and we watch the events fly by with the characters, and it is somewhat timeless. We see how the 1900s were viewed from the 1930s, and I wonder now how much films like this continued to affect our view. We no longer talk about the Boer War, but even re-assessing history it seems our focus has never changed.
The film was one of the first to use the words "damn" and "hell", as in "Hell of a lot". These had been used in the play. There was concern at the Hays Office that this could set a precedent. Fox president Sidney Kent was quoted saying the mild profanity "could not offend any person; and, after all, that was the real purpose of the Code. And as far as the use creating a precedent which might be followed by other producers is concerned, the best answer would be that anyone who could make a picture as good as Cavalcade might be justified in following the precedent." Some of the early Best Picture winners are really duds in retrospect. Looking back now (2016) they are bland, or aged poorly, or are sometimes musicals that just no longer impress. "Cavalcade" is a rare exception in that it seems like it has not aged one bit. The years go by, and we watch the events fly by with the characters, and it is somewhat timeless. We see how the 1900s were viewed from the 1930s, and I wonder now how much films like this continued to affect our view. We no longer talk about the Boer War, but even re-assessing history it seems our focus has never changed.