Kind Hearts and Coronets is a 1949 English black comedy directed by Robert Hamer. It was written by John Dighton and Hamer, and is loosely based on the novel Israel Rank: The Autobiography of a Criminal by Roy Horniman. The Kind Hearts and Coronets title derives fromTennyson's poem Lady Clara Vere de Vere (1842): "Kind hearts are more than coronets, And simple faith than Norman blood."
Dennis Price plays Louis Mazzini. Alec Guinness plays eight members of the D'Ascoyne family, including an active man in his early 20s, a feeble octogenarian, and a suffragette. Joan Greenwood and Valerie Hobson play Louis' two romantic interests.
Kind Hearts and Coronets is regarded as one of the best Ealing Studios films, and is listed inTime magazine's top 100, and in the BFI Top 100 British films. In 2000, Total Film magazine readers voted Kind Hearts and Coronets as the 25th-greatest comedy film, and, in 2004, named it the seventh-greatest British film. (wiki)
