Kind Hearts and Coronets 1949

type: Movie

language: English

duration: 101 min

genre: crime

theme: black comedy

director: Robert Hamer

Score: 7 / 10

Kind Hearts and Coronets is a 1949 British crime black comedy film. It features Dennis Price, Joan Greenwood, Valerie Hobson and Alec Guinness; Guinness plays eight characters. The plot is loosely based on the novel Israel Rank: The Autobiography of a Criminal (1907) by Roy Horniman. It concerns Louis D'Ascoyne Mazzini, the son of a woman disowned by her aristocratic family for marrying out of her social class. After her death, Louis decides to take revenge on the family and take the dukedom by murdering the eight people ahead of him in the line of succession to the title.

Plot

In Edwardian England, Louis D'Ascoyne Mazzini, 10th Duke of Chalfont, is in prison, awaiting his hanging for murder the following morning. As he writes his memoirs, a flashback ensues.

Cast

More details

author	John Dighton
contentLocation	England London
director	Robert Hamer
editor	Peter Tanner
events	Birthright disownment familicide high society legal succession mate choice nobility opportunism revenge upper class
genre	comedy crime drama social
keywords	anglican anglican communion bachelor flat bachelor pad balloon boating accident bow and arrow burial vault caviar childhood friends co-respondent darkroom disown draper edwardian edwardian england edwardian era flashback force going down with his ship hang house of lords hunting accident italian opera learn married matabeleland mistress morning only child opera singer peerage port private bank school friend scotland yard shoot st james\'s suffragette suicide note suspicion of murder the captain goes down with the ship tit-bits tried by his peers wait widow
musicBy	Ernest Irving
producer	Michael Balcon Michael Relph
productionCompany	Ealing Studios
publisher	General Film Distributors
recordedAt	Ealing Studios
theme	black comedy