Despite the efforts of Buster Keaton and the Keystone Cops, who provide some uproarious sequences, "Hollywood Cavalcade" belongs to the great middle class. There is entirely too much of Don Ameche, and too little of Hollywood. No impression is created of the glitter town's lusty early years. In effect it resolves into a Don Ameche Cavaleade, the story of a brilliant but erratic director of the old silent days who bombasts his way through many years of happiness and stark tragedy, and in the end manages to get Alice Faye and some gray hairs. Miss Faye, surprisingly effective in a role with no lyrics, very little legs, and custard pies in the face, plays the part of a Broadway star who comes to Hollywood at the instigation of Ameche. Though she marries the wrong man first, he contrives to drive into a telegraph pole at the crucial movement, thus leaving the road open to dour Don. In spite of an overdose of Ameche and the triteness of the plot, Buster Keaton and the Cops make it worth dodging through the maniac drivers on Harvard Square.

In addition there is a "March of Time" on the Associated Press, and "Gantry the Great," which is about a blind racehorse, and fine for those who prefer horseflesh.