To my generation, growing up in the seventies, Diana Dors was something of a joke, a blowsy, overweight actress who was well past her prime but refused to admit it, the sort of woman for whom the phrase "mutton dressed as lamb" could have been invented. To my father's generation in the fifties, however, she was one of the world's most beautiful women, an authentic sex symbol who could have been Britain's answer to Marilyn Monroe or Brigitte Bardot. (Interestingly, all three actresses had alliterative initials- MM, BB and DD). She never, however, quite made it to the top. She briefly worked in Hollywood in the late fifties, but did not prove a success, and after a period appearing in Las Vegas returned to Britain where she spent much of the latter part of her career appearing in dire sex comedies. (Which doubtless explains, in answer to another reviewer's question, why she was never made a Commander of the British Empire).
Yet in real life Dors was far from being a dumb blonde. She was a classically trained actress, a product of Britain's Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. In her early career in Britain she appeared in some critically acclaimed films, notably J. Lee Thompson's anti-death penalty film "Yield to the Night" in which she played a convicted murderess. So where did it all go wrong? The answer, at least according to this film, lay in her chaotic private life, particularly in her first marriage to Dennis Hamilton. Hamilton was a handsome young man who claimed to be an actor himself but who never seemed to appear in anything. As a husband he proved a disaster, being unfaithful, frequently drunk, violent and abusive. He also had a baleful influence on Dors' professional career, talking her out of making a film with Laurence Olivier (at the time the greatest name in British acting) and unsuccessfully trying to dissuade her from doing "Yield to the Night". In Hollywood, Hamilton's loutish and aggressive behaviour alienated many influential people. When Dors, provoked beyond endurance by Hamilton, started an affair with Rod Steiger, her studio, RKO, invoked a "morality clause" in order to terminate her contract. This may seem unfair; she was doubtless far from being the only Hollywood star of the time to have been guilty of adultery, but RKO had been deeply embarrassed by Hamilton's conduct and wanted any excuse to be rid of her.
In the second part of the film, which covers the period from the early sixties until Dors' death in 1984, the emphasis is on her relationship with her third husband, Alan Lake. (Her second husband, the comedian Dickie Dawson, would appear from the film to have been a rather dull fellow). Lake was another actor, considerably younger than Dors herself, who appears to have been something of a wild young man. Like Hamilton, he was an alcoholic, and soon after his marriage to Dors served a jail term for his part in a pub brawl. The marriage, however, was ultimately more successful, as Dors persuaded Lake to give up drinking and they remained married until her death. Indeed, Lake was so grief-stricken when she died that he committed suicide soon afterwards.
This film was originally made as a two-part mini-series for British television. Dors is played by two actresses, Keeley Hawes and Amanda Redman. Hawes plays the younger Dors of the forties and fifties, but I felt that she struggled under the burden of bearing very little resemblance to the woman she was portraying. She was never able to convey the seductive glamour which was the young Diana's hallmark and which shone out of her even in her most second-rate films. Amanda Redman as the older Dors was better, but the best acting came from Rupert Graves as Hamilton. Graves made Hamilton seem convincingly unpleasant and yet was also able to bring out the character's dangerous fascination for women, persuading us that an intelligent woman like Dors could have fallen for him even though she knew him to be a cad.
Screen biographies may be telling a story based upon fact, but they way they tell that story often has much in common with works of fiction, and this one has an underlying narrative structure that could essentially be that of a novel. The heroine has a troubled, turbulent youth, but then finds the love of her life and achieves and true happiness with him after helping him overcome his own problems. That could almost be the plot of "Jane Eyre". As is common with biopics of this type, details that do not fit in with the film's quasi-fictional plot tend to be sidelined. (The film ignores, for example, the fact that many of Dors' later films were fairly seedy, and allegations that she had a lesbian affair with her co-star in one of those films, the porn star Mary Millington). Dors may have aroused admiration for her charitable work and for her brave fight against the cancer that was eventually to kill her, but she never quite achieved the status of National Treasure that the film suggests. 6/10
Yet in real life Dors was far from being a dumb blonde. She was a classically trained actress, a product of Britain's Royal Academy of Dramatic Art. In her early career in Britain she appeared in some critically acclaimed films, notably J. Lee Thompson's anti-death penalty film "Yield to the Night" in which she played a convicted murderess. So where did it all go wrong? The answer, at least according to this film, lay in her chaotic private life, particularly in her first marriage to Dennis Hamilton. Hamilton was a handsome young man who claimed to be an actor himself but who never seemed to appear in anything. As a husband he proved a disaster, being unfaithful, frequently drunk, violent and abusive. He also had a baleful influence on Dors' professional career, talking her out of making a film with Laurence Olivier (at the time the greatest name in British acting) and unsuccessfully trying to dissuade her from doing "Yield to the Night". In Hollywood, Hamilton's loutish and aggressive behaviour alienated many influential people. When Dors, provoked beyond endurance by Hamilton, started an affair with Rod Steiger, her studio, RKO, invoked a "morality clause" in order to terminate her contract. This may seem unfair; she was doubtless far from being the only Hollywood star of the time to have been guilty of adultery, but RKO had been deeply embarrassed by Hamilton's conduct and wanted any excuse to be rid of her.
In the second part of the film, which covers the period from the early sixties until Dors' death in 1984, the emphasis is on her relationship with her third husband, Alan Lake. (Her second husband, the comedian Dickie Dawson, would appear from the film to have been a rather dull fellow). Lake was another actor, considerably younger than Dors herself, who appears to have been something of a wild young man. Like Hamilton, he was an alcoholic, and soon after his marriage to Dors served a jail term for his part in a pub brawl. The marriage, however, was ultimately more successful, as Dors persuaded Lake to give up drinking and they remained married until her death. Indeed, Lake was so grief-stricken when she died that he committed suicide soon afterwards.
This film was originally made as a two-part mini-series for British television. Dors is played by two actresses, Keeley Hawes and Amanda Redman. Hawes plays the younger Dors of the forties and fifties, but I felt that she struggled under the burden of bearing very little resemblance to the woman she was portraying. She was never able to convey the seductive glamour which was the young Diana's hallmark and which shone out of her even in her most second-rate films. Amanda Redman as the older Dors was better, but the best acting came from Rupert Graves as Hamilton. Graves made Hamilton seem convincingly unpleasant and yet was also able to bring out the character's dangerous fascination for women, persuading us that an intelligent woman like Dors could have fallen for him even though she knew him to be a cad.
Screen biographies may be telling a story based upon fact, but they way they tell that story often has much in common with works of fiction, and this one has an underlying narrative structure that could essentially be that of a novel. The heroine has a troubled, turbulent youth, but then finds the love of her life and achieves and true happiness with him after helping him overcome his own problems. That could almost be the plot of "Jane Eyre". As is common with biopics of this type, details that do not fit in with the film's quasi-fictional plot tend to be sidelined. (The film ignores, for example, the fact that many of Dors' later films were fairly seedy, and allegations that she had a lesbian affair with her co-star in one of those films, the porn star Mary Millington). Dors may have aroused admiration for her charitable work and for her brave fight against the cancer that was eventually to kill her, but she never quite achieved the status of National Treasure that the film suggests. 6/10
