Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949)

Kind Hearts and Coronets
Directed by Robert Hamer
Written by Robert Hamer and James Dighton from a novel by Roy Horniman
1949/UK
Ealing Studios
Repeat viewing/Amazon Instant
#231 of 1001 Movies You Must See Before You Die

[box] Louis Mazzini: The next morning I went out shooting with Ethelred – or rather, to watch Ethelred shooting; for my principles will not allow me to take a direct part in blood sports.[/box]

As the film opens, the Duke of D’Ascoyne (Dennis Price) is calmly awaiting his execution.  He has just completed his memoirs, which detail his strange ascent to the title.  We segue into flashback.

The Duke was born of the union of a daughter of the then-duke with an Italian opera singer and christened Louis Mazzini.  His mother was promptly disowned by her family and a couple of different attempts at reconciliation following the death of her husband were rebuffed.  Louis grew up steeped in the family history and aware of the remote chance that he could yet become Duke himself.  The refusal of the Duke to allow his mother’s burial in the family crypt is the spark that lights Louis’s determination to eliminate every D’Ascoyne standing between him and the peerage.

Following his mother’s death, Louis becomes a lowly draper and moves in with a neighbor. There he spends many happy hours with his childhood sweetheart Sibella (Joan Greenwood).  She, however, elects to marry the loathsome Lionel for his money.  Their dalliance, however, resumes quickly after the wedding.

The bulk of the story is devoted to Louis’s imaginative murders of the eight D’Ascoynes standing in his way.  These are all played by Alec Guiness to great effect.  After he is close to his prize, Louis decides that Edith (Valerie Hobson), widow of the youngest D’Ascoyne to die, will make an ideal Duchess.  His failure to predict the full fury of Sibella’s wrath has landed him in the condemned man’s cell.  But there may yet be a way out …

This is a bone dry British comedy with many digs at the English aristocracy.  I find it more wry than laugh out loud hilarious though I did giggle at the executioner’s lines.  Its great drawing card is the multiple roles taken on by Guinness who disappears, chameleon like, into characters of every age, sex, and occupation.  I am also in love with the archly purring Joan Greenwood and her ridiculous hats.  Recommended.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yidAvsBhD7U

Trailer