Kind Hearts and Coronets 3.5/4

Seen in theater.  Released 1949.
Directed by Robert Hamer.
Written by  Roy Horniman, novel. Robert Hamer, John Dighton.
With  Dennis Price, Valerie Hobson, Joan Greenwood, Alec Guinness

 Sibella: He says he wants to go to Europe to expand his mind.
Louis Mazzini: He certainly has room to do so.

Above is a quote from the film.  One of the funniest I have seen for a long time.  It's a black comedy from England.  In it, the son of a disowned mother tries to achieve baronhood and avenge his mother by killing off his whole family.  It is told in flashback with a memoir that he writes in prison awaiting his death sentence, so everything is hilariously detached. and deadpan.

The film started out slow, and was made difficult to understand by the quality of the sound coupled with fast speaking Brits, but I was able to get the hang of it after a while.

An interesting fact about the movie I didn't realize while watching is that Alec Guinnes played all the characters of the family who were being knocked off.



Here's a clip.