constancebryce Review of Lady Caroline Lamb

Lady Caroline Lamb (1972)

Not especially accurate or well acted really...

[6/10 · 28 November 2022]

But 70's "costume dramas" often ignored facts for drama. The basic premise is true to the diaries of Lady Melbourne and her daughter etc...who all wrote of this affair at the time. Also George iii was still king at the time, not George iv as listed in the credits. He did not become King until 1820 and this affair was in 1812 so he was regent. But she did run after Wellington later on so that part is true, whether or not she actually slept with him. Caroline was oddly reared as her mother, Lady Bessborough, did not know what to do with her. She may have been bi-polar or had some undiagnosed mental illness...something we will never know. Her husband the future Lord Melbourne, who was Queen Victoria's first and much loved Prime Minister, was the picture of patience with Caroline, always forgiving her and refusing to a divorce though his family begged him to abandon her. Even after she wrote Glenarvon, a thinly veiled account of her affair which included portrayals of her relatives and caused her to be exiled from society, he stood by her. Their only child who survived infancy was born with some sort of mental limitations and was difficult to handle for both parents though Caroline tried, mostly by ignoring his issues. Caroline died at age 41 possibly of complications from alcohol abuse. Her husband's family loathed her but she remained close to her mother and husband throughout her eventful life.