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IMDbPro

The Divine Lady

  • 19281928
  • Not RatedNot Rated
  • 1h 39m
IMDb RATING
6.2/10
827
YOUR RATING
The Divine Lady (1928)
DramaHistoryRomance
The story of the romance between Emma, Lady Hamilton, and British war hero Admiral Horatio Nelson.The story of the romance between Emma, Lady Hamilton, and British war hero Admiral Horatio Nelson.The story of the romance between Emma, Lady Hamilton, and British war hero Admiral Horatio Nelson.
IMDb RATING
6.2/10
827
YOUR RATING
    • Frank Lloyd
  • Writers
    • E. Barrington(story)
    • Forrest Halsey(adaptation)
    • Harry Carr(titles)
  • Stars
    • Corinne Griffith
    • Victor Varconi
    • H.B. Warner
    • Frank Lloyd
  • Writers
    • E. Barrington(story)
    • Forrest Halsey(adaptation)
    • Harry Carr(titles)
  • Stars
    • Corinne Griffith
    • Victor Varconi
    • H.B. Warner
  • See production, box office & company info
    • 16User reviews
    • 8Critic reviews
  • See production, box office & company info
  • See more at IMDbPro
    • Won 1 Oscar

    Photos20

    Corinne Griffith and Victor Varconi in The Divine Lady (1928)
    Corinne Griffith and Victor Varconi in The Divine Lady (1928)
    The Divine Lady (1928)
    Corinne Griffith and Ian Keith in The Divine Lady (1928)
    Corinne Griffith and Ian Keith in The Divine Lady (1928)
    Corinne Griffith in The Divine Lady (1928)
    William Conklin in The Divine Lady (1928)
    Marie Dressler and Ian Keith in The Divine Lady (1928)
    Victor Varconi in The Divine Lady (1928)
    The Divine Lady (1928)
    Ian Keith in The Divine Lady (1928)
    Marie Dressler and Corinne Griffith in The Divine Lady (1928)

    Top cast

    Edit
    Corinne Griffith
    Corinne Griffith
    • Emma Hart
    Victor Varconi
    Victor Varconi
    • Horatio Nelson
    H.B. Warner
    H.B. Warner
    • Sir William Hamilton
    Ian Keith
    Ian Keith
    • Honorable Charles Greville
    Marie Dressler
    Marie Dressler
    • Mrs. Hart
    Montagu Love
    Montagu Love
    • Captain Hardy
    William Conklin
    William Conklin
    • Romney
    Dorothy Cumming
    Dorothy Cumming
    • Queen Maria Carolina
    Michael Vavitch
    Michael Vavitch
    • King Ferdinand
    Evelyn Hall
    Evelyn Hall
    • Duchess of Devonshire
    Helen Jerome Eddy
    Helen Jerome Eddy
    • Lady Nelson
    Ben Alexander
    Ben Alexander
    • Young Lieutenant
    • (uncredited)
    Joan Bennett
    Joan Bennett
    • Extra
    • (uncredited)
    Leroy Boles
    Leroy Boles
    • Neighbor Kid
    • (uncredited)
    Jackie Combs
    • Neighbor Kid
    • (uncredited)
    Godfrey Craig
    • Powder Monkey
    • (uncredited)
    Vondell Darr
    • Neighbor Kid
    • (uncredited)
    Andy Devine
    Andy Devine
    • Extra
    • (uncredited)
      • Frank Lloyd
    • Writers
      • E. Barrington(story)
      • Forrest Halsey(adaptation)
      • Harry Carr(titles)
    • All cast & crew
    • Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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    Storyline

    Edit

    Did you know

    Edit
    • Trivia
      With this film, Frank Lloyd became one of only two directors to win the best director Oscar without their movie also being nominated for best picture. The only other film to win a directing Oscar without a best picture nomination was Two Arabian Knights (1927), which won the only Oscar ever given for Comedy Direction to Lewis Milestone. Both Lloyd and Milestone won additional best director Oscars for directing best picture winners, Lloyd for Cavalcade (1933) and Milestone for All Quiet on the Western Front (1930).
    • Goofs
      The October 1786 calendar shows the month beginning on a Tuesday. October 1, 1786 was a Sunday.
    • Quotes

      Honorable Charles Greville: [about Emma] I am sorry to lose a good cook, but I will not tolerate a brazen hussy.

    • Connections
      Remade as That Hamilton Woman (1941)
    • Soundtracks
      Lady Divine
      (1928)

      Music by Nathaniel Shilkret

      Lyrics by Richard Kountz

      Played during the opening credits and sung offscreen by an unidentified singer

      In the score often as the love theme

      Reprised at the end by an unidentified singer offscreen

    User reviews16

    Review
    Review
    Featured review
    7/10
    THE DIVINE LADY (Frank Lloyd, 1929) ***
    Scottish film-maker Frank Lloyd (a would-have-been birthday celebrant on the day I watched the film under review) was one of the founding members of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences – best-known for holding the annual Oscar ceremony. He was also the second Academy Award winner for Best Direction for this rarely seen historical epic which, as it turned out, was the only film in Oscar history to win that category without an accompanying nod for Best Picture (a feat which, given the current rules, is practically impossible to repeat itself). However, Lloyd was even nominated for directing two more movies that same year – WEARY RIVER (which I own a copy of but did not manage to locate in time for inclusion in this ongoing Oscar marathon!) and the unavailable DRAG. He would later emerge victorious again for CAVALCADE (1933) and received his last nomination for MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY (1935) which, like the latter, was also named Best Picture. For the record, his other films that have had notable brushes with Oscar were EAST LYNNE (1931), BERKELEY SQUARE (1933) and IF I WERE KING (1938) – and, although I have all three in my collection, they will have to wait a similarly-themed marathon for their first viewing. After such a distinguished career, Lloyd semi-retired in the mid-1940s and only made the occasional movie in the following decade before dying in 1960.

    THE DIVINE LADY – not to be confused with the contemporaneous Greta Garbo vehicle THE DIVINE WOMAN (1928) only a fragment of which exists today – tells the oft-told tale of the controversial affair between Lady Emma Hamilton and Lord Horatio Nelson; I am already familiar with the Alexander Korda version of events entitled THAT HAMILTON WOMAN (1941; the only on screen pairing of then husband-and-wife team of Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier) and also have the Glenda Jackson/Peter Finch- starring A BEQUEST TO THE NATION aka THE NELSON AFFAIR (1973) in my unwatched pile; for the record, I would love to catch Richard Oswald's even earlier LADY HAMILTON (1921), in which the ubiquitous pair of Conrad Veidt and Werner Krauss played Nelson and Sir William Hamilton respectively, and Christian-Jaque's international version EMMA HAMILTON (1968) – with Michele Mercier, Richard Johnson and John Mills.

    The narrative here starts out with an 'impoverished' aristocrat (Ian Keith) dismissing a newly-engaged cook (Marie Dressler) because of the "vulgar" antics of her daughter Emma Hart (an Oscar-nominated Corinne Griffith, though her name is bafflingly omitted in Roy Pickard's "The Oscar Movies From A-Z" and seems to be disputed elsewhere too!); her entreaties to rethink his harsh decision win him over and impress his artist friend who wants to paint a portrait of her. Before long, she is accompanying her employer on social occasions, until she embarrasses him by bursting into song at a fair thereby attracting the attentions of every male within hearing distance. He is convinced to dispose of her by thrusting her into the arms of his aging womanizing uncle Sir William Hamilton (H.B. Warner!) even though she had fallen for Keith himself in the meantime. He soon gets to regret his actions when the wealthy relative (whom he had hoped to inherit) marries the wench and turns her into Lady Emma Hamilton, Ambassadress to Sicily! Although that island is ostensibly neutral to the ongoing conflict between England and France, the king sides with France while the queen (sister to the deposed Marie Antoinette) secretly sides with Britain. When Lady Hamilton decides to intervene, the latter's allegiance is instrumental in overturning a Royal decree not to help the ailing British fleet headed by Admiral Horatio Nelson (Victor Varconi – who is not shown wearing a black patch over his blind eye but does get to lose a hand!). Apart from helping the British repel the enemy, this fateful event brings Emma and Horatio together for the first time and, as they say, the rest is history...

    The understandably battered print – culled from the "Warner Archives" DVD-R – does not really do the film much justice but remains reasonably watchable throughout. Indeed THE DIVINE LADY is a handsomely mounted and well-crafted production (cinematographer John F. Seitz also received an Oscar nomination for his work here), with Lloyd's solid direction smoothing over the crude sound sequences interspersed throughout where we hear Emma Hamilton sing, and only calling attention to itself intermittently, as in the aforementioned fairground sequence.
    helpful•4
    1
    • Bunuel1976
    • Feb 4, 2014

    Details

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    • Release date
      • December 26, 1928 (Denmark)
      • United States
      • None
      • English
    • Also known as
    • Filming locations
      • Warner Brothers Burbank Studios - 4000 Warner Boulevard, Burbank, California, USA
    • Production company
      • First National Pictures
    • See more company credits at IMDbPro

    Technical specs

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    • 1 hour 39 minutes
      • Black and White
      • Silent

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