Kind Hearts and Coronets, on the other hand, is a very charming film that doesn't quite grab you right away but lasts much longer than you expect. Alec Guinness plays all eight members of the D'Ascoyne family (one of them female, one a priest who can't stay awake, among others). Despite the comedy, the coldness of the murderous Louis Mazzini and the selfishness of his paramous Sibella can be quite chilling. The comedy is delivered with such deadpan you almost miss it and then it dawns on you after a slight delay. It definitely makes me want to look into more of the Ealing studio films.
I had to Google some of of the lines to recount. Some memorable witticisms (thanks to Wikipedia):
Sibella [sobbing]: Oh Louis! I don't want to marry Lionel!
Louis: Why not?
Sibella: He's so dull.
Louis: I must admit he exhibits the most extraordinary capacity for middle age that I've ever encountered in a young man of twenty-four.
Sibella [referring to Lionel]: He says he wants to go to Europe to expand his mind.
Louis: He certainly has room to do so.
Louis: Did you enjoy your honeymoon?
Sibella [matter-of-factly]: Not at all.
Louis [faintly surprised]: Not at all?
Sibella [definitely]: Not at all.
Reverend Lord Henry d'Ascoyne: ...I always say that my West Window has all the exuberance of Chaucer without, happily, any of the concomitant crudities of his period.
There are also a number of droll voice-overs from Mazzini. He despatches the first D'Ascoyne over a weir in the company of a girl with whom he, D'Ascoyne, had been enjoying an illicit weekend in Maidenhead.
Louis: I was sorry about the girl, but found some relief in the reflection that she had presumably, during the weekend, already undergone a fate worse than death...
