Kind Hearts & Coronets - what an exquisite piece it is! One scene has had me chuckling all morning, where he's sitting sipping tea in the garden with his wife-to-be, her husband having headed off to his potting shed-turned darkroom to develop some frames before lunch, unaware of our villain/hero's swap of petrol for the paraffin in his darkroom lamp. Cue a dull thud in the background, calmly registered by villain, who continues the conversation. No mention for quite some time of the smoke gently drifting up from behind a high wall in the background....
Justly famed for Alec Guinness's multi-part tour de force, the film is a sublime work quite apart from that, with excellent performances all round, a genuinely witty and razor sharp script, and a brilliant core story driving everything along beautifully. The best Ealing Comedy ever? Yup, I reckon it is. Lavender Hill Mob and Ladykillers run it close, but Kind Hearts is just impeccable.
