Lady Hamilton, the wife of a British ambassador in Naples, falls in love with Admiral Horatio Nelson — at the height of the Napoleonic Wars.
In That Hamilton Woman (1941), Vivien Leigh plays Emma, Lady Hamilton, who, as a young woman, is sent to Naples, where she marries Sir William Hamilton, played by Alan Mowbray, the British ambassador. There she meets Admiral Horatio Nelson, played by Laurence Olivier, and their love affair becomes famous, even as Nelson leads Britain’s navy against France.
Leigh plays Emma with a warmth and a sadness that make her more than a historical figure. She shows Emma’s rise from poverty, her glamour in Naples, and her fall after Nelson’s death at Trafalgar. Her scenes with Olivier, her real-life husband at the time, are full of a natural intimacy.
That Hamilton Woman is a romantic historical drama, and Leigh’s Emma is one of her most appealing performances: a woman who loves greatly, and who pays for it.