Madonna of the Seven Moons
Sue Harper reveals how a swashbuckling tale of gypsy romance opens an unexpected window on 1940s women in Britain.
When Madonna of the Seven Moons was released in December 1944, it was an immediate smash hit; cinema audiences in London and, later, in the provinces flocked to see it. The trade magazine Kinematograph Weekly soon listed it as a box-office success. But the 'quality' critics - those writing for highbrow readers - panned the film and tried to persuade their readers not to attend. In The Sunday Times, Dilys Powell derided the film's preoccupation with sex: 'it is a highly osculatory piece, comprising the kiss filched, the kiss rejected, the kiss paternal, the kiss devout, the kiss marital, the kiss passionate'. From the far right of the cultural politics spectrum, husband-and-wife team E.W. and M.M. Robson objected to the film's 'marital double-crossings, venal murder, and split-minded lunacies'.
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