Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

Sameer Callahan It really made me laugh, but for some moments I was tearing up because I could relate so much.

Sabah Hensley This is a dark and sometimes deeply uncomfortable drama

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Alex da Silva Vivien Leigh (Lady Hamilton) is caught shoplifting and put in a cell where she recounts her life story to Heather Angel. It's a story that reveals her to be the ex-mistress of Laurence Olivier (Lord Nelson) and ex-wife of Alan Mowbray (Lord Hamilton) and it details her romance with the English naval hero up until his death at the 'Battle of Trafalgar'.The film is long but this doesn't seem to matter as the story captures the audience from the beginning. The cast are all good and, apart from the leads of Leigh and Olivier, mentions must go to Alan Mowbray who ends up as an hallucinating wreck and, in particular, Gladys Cooper (Lady Nelson) who holds her dignity and whose every scene is filled with tension.There are some powerful scenes, eg, Vivien Leigh receiving the news of her lover's death, and the film gives you a bit of everything - romance, humour, drama and good actors. It ends rather suddenly - it would have been interesting to know what happens next and what happens to the child - but the story doesn't take things that far. To her, Lady Hamilton's life ends at the battle of Trafalgar.

blanche-2 Laurence Olivier and Vivien Leigh star in "That Hamilton Woman," a 1941 film directed by Alexander Korda. It's the true story of Emma Hamilton (Leigh) and her long affair with Lord Nelson (Olivier). The story actually sticks pretty close to the true facts, though by necessity it leaves out a great deal. The story is told by Lady Hamilton herself in flashback.The real Emma was a prostitute who, as in the story, eventually marries her ex-fiancé's uncle and has the title of Lady Hamilton. She becomes a very famous artist's model - this is completely left out of the film. She falls in love with Lord Nelson, and the two embark on an affair that produces a child.Vivien Leigh makes a smashing Lady Hamilton - beautiful, desirable, determined. She photographs beautifully in black and white. Olivier is a stoic Nelson, a great naval hero who can't stay away from his duty, despite massive injuries.A very opulent production with two stars whose real-life story had some parallels to Hamilton and Nelson, "That Lady Hamilton" is a very absorbing film that Leigh fans in particular will not want to miss.

samhill5215 Vivien Leigh's career is usually defined by her two most famous films, "Gone With the Wind" and "A Streetcar Named Desire". Although certainly good in the first she is magnificent in the second, with an unparalleled maturity and sensibility that defies all explanation. For me Blanche Dubois IS Vivien Leigh.Having seen "That Hamilton Woman" for the first time recently, Leigh's portrayal kept me riveted and anxious for her next interpretation of that tragic woman's life despite the fact that I am familiar with her history. Perhaps it is because of that familiarity that I was anxious to see how she would act out the events. Nonetheless I was very impressed and can say that "Hamilton" is now my second favorite Leigh film after "Streetcar".My only beef is with the naval scenes. They needlessly interfered with the film's flow and had little if anything to do with Lady Hamilton's life other than in the way they affected her love affair with Nelson. They could have easily been removed without penalty. Nelson's death at Trafalgar could have easily been covered in the scene where his lieutenant breaks the news to Emma. There was no need for the naval battle scene. After all this wasn't a movie about Nelson but about Emma Hamilton. All that chest beating and heroic music simply took away from what ends up being a tragic love story.So watch it for Vivien Leigh and fast forward through the battle scenes.

Boba_Fett1138 The movie features a great and intriguing story, set during the Napoleon era, when England was in war with France. It's a story about love and war. In other words a great typical epic historical drama.It features a still young Laurence Olivier in an also early role from him. Especially his voice and accent makes him see and sound almost unrecognizable. His acting is great but I also must admit that his acting improved more over the years. He probably is one of my favorite actors of all time actually. Vivien Leigh still gives the best performance of the movie and her character carries the movie. No big surprise of course, since this movie is an autobiographic one about Emma Lady Hamilton, the character played by Vivien Leigh, who is historically known as the mistress of Lord Horatio Nelson. Of course the acting is quite melodramatic at parts but that is due to the movie its time settings and genre and the time period it got made in. The movie got made shortly after Laurence Olivier en Vivien Leigh got married together. A marriage that would last for 20 years, which is quite long for an Hollywood marriage, even an early one.It's a great written movie with wonderful dialog in it. It's a story that is being told with lots of class and pace, ensuring that the movie gets never dull in parts. It also really isn't as melodramatic as you perhaps would expect from a movie from within such a genre and time period it got made and set in. Quite surprised it didn't get nominated for any important Oscar's at its time. Perhaps it was because due to the very reason that the movie wasn't as typical and melodramatic as most other movies of its time. But oh well, it got released in a tough year, with other nominees such as "Citizen Kane", "Sergeant York" and "The Maltese Falcon". It still did get nominated for 4 Oscar's though, of which best cinematography, black-and-white, was the most important one. It only won the one for best sound, recording.But it's not hard to see why this movie still got mostly nominated in the visual categories. The movie is a great looking, not only due to its settings but also its costume design, sets and of course most importantly it's nice dynamic camera-work, that in parts also seemed quite modern for its time. Cinematographer Rudolph Maté would receive a total of 5 Oscar nominations during his life and career but he unfortunately never won any. Oh well, at least he still had a great career, with also some great classics behind his name, such as "Stella Dallas", "The Lady from Shanghai", "Dodsworth", "Vampyr - Der Traum des Allan Grey" and really many, many more.Even though the movie is just 2 hours short, it feels much longer because the story is so epic and so many things happen in it. The movie is also set at many different location in Europe, which enhances the movie its epic feeling.A great, grand romantic drama, based on real events.9/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/