A black comedy, with beautiful writing — the screenplay, co-written by Robert Hamer, its director, is a joy— and flawlessly silly film-making.

| Mar 30, 2023

No detail has been left to chance. Each word is carefully weighed, there is not one word too many, each scene is meticulously prepared, and none could possibly have been structured or executed better.

| Apr 4, 2022

The ideal film would, of course, have... the most talented director in the canvas chair a superbly-written screen-play and the best possible cast. This British comedy has come so close to this mark that it is difficult to see how it could be improved.

| Mar 30, 2022

The narration is splendidly wry and full of details, revealing dastardly intentions and acerbic observations.

| Original Score: 9/10 | Aug 13, 2020

Drownings, explosions, and poisonings, their ethical status barely mentioned, let alone chastised, roll by like carriages in the park. The comedy is as black as widow's weeds. Artfulness is all.

| Nov 22, 2019

Dennis Price is a polite society murderer, and the sensational Alec Guinness is all eight of the aristocratic targets on his list.

| Oct 9, 2019

I keep wondering how the film manages to stay so light in spite of the notional black comedy of its plot. I think it has something to do with the sense of being out of time that I mentioned earlier: not timeless, but resistant to time.

| Sep 20, 2019

A diabolically clever comedy.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Sep 14, 2019

As scathing a critique of the British upper classes as the cinema has ever given us, disguised as a light comedy with a charming exterior.

| Original Score: 3.5/4 | Sep 13, 2019

Even the title, from a poem by Tennyson, is perfect. A bona fide treat.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Jun 7, 2019

A lovely, intelligent and warm comedy about a man who will do anything to reclaim his birthright.

| Jun 5, 2019

This is an exceedingly funny film, scintillating with rapid witty dialogue by John Dighton and Robert Hamer, who has also directed with excellent taste.

| Jan 23, 2018

A high comedy that is enlivened with cynicism, loaded with dramatic irony and shot through with a suspicion of social satire.

| Dec 20, 2014

Shot through with pitch black humour and biting satire on both the moribund upper class and the grasping venality of the suburban middle class.

| Original Score: 4/5 | Sep 1, 2011

Hamer had a particular liking for the late-Victorian/Edwardian world and was a great Francophile.

| Aug 22, 2011

Amazingly courageous for its day (1949) in combining bad taste with good comedy.

Full Review | Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 19, 2011

Its Edwardian setting is all elegance, but nonchalance is the key to its genius.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 19, 2011

Kind Hearts gently undermines the notions of nobility and inherited privilege.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 19, 2011

This was Robert Hamer's masterpiece...

| Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 18, 2011

Technically brilliant and savagely funny, serial killing has never looked so much fun.

| Original Score: 5/5 | Aug 18, 2011