Kind Hearts and Coronets (1949) Starring Alec Guinness

Trust me, Clara Vere de Vere,
From yon blue heavens above us bent
The grand old gardener and his wife 

Smile at the claims of long descent.
Howe'er it be, it seems to me,
'Tis only noble to be good.
Kind hearts are more than coronets,
And simple faith than Norman blood.

- Alfred, Lord Tennyson

'Tis only noble to be good.  Tell that to Louis Mazzini, whose mother suffered an ignoble life and death at the hands of her own family, the D'Ascoynes, headed by the Duke of Chalfont.  Swearing to avenge his mother, Louis decides to murder the eight D'Ascoynes who stand between him and the ducal throne.  We know Louis succeeds because the film begins with him in prison, charged with murder, and being identified as the tenth Duke of Chalfont.  How, then, did he pull off his plan?

Kind Hearts and Coronets was one of the black comedies to come out of Ealing Studios in Britain just after the Second World War.  Other notable examples are The Lady Killers and The Lavender Hill Mob.  The difficulty faced by the producers of these movies was to make the audience care for characters who are disreputable or even downright amoral.  How then did they make us care for Louis Mazzini?

To start off with, Louis is played with infinite smoothness by Dennis Price.  The cold, calculating, killing machine is suave and charming; and he manages to gain the affections of not one, but two young ladies.  Louis has a way with words and a dry, roguish wit that he employs in both the dialogue of the movie and in the monologues he delivers in his role as narrator.  And these little gems of wit seem pardon Louis in an undefinable manner as he drowns and bombs and poisons his way closer to his inheritance.

Opposite Price, we have Alec Guinness, who plays all eight members of the D'Ascoyne family on Louis' hit list.  With a few exceptions, Louis makes the acquaintances of his relatives (usually without them being aware of their blood ties to him).  Guinness is able to portray them with same degree of likeability that Price brings to his character, albeit in quite diverse ways.  But we are not allowed to forget the shabby treatment these same charming characters doled out to Louis' mother.

In the end, we are in the morally dubious position of both liking and disliking a serial murderer and his victims, with the balance sheet tipped slightly in Louis' favour.  I think that it the success of the comedic elements of the movie, as black as they may be, that sees us arrive at this position; and it is a credit to the writers, actors and director that we do so.  How much easier it would have been to condemn Louis out of hand, and to forgive his family.

So, was there a last minute reprieve for Louis?  Or, like his family, did he get his comeuppance? You will have to see the movie to find out.  No cheating, now.