Born to a lifetime's struggle after his mother was disinherited by her aristocratic kin for marrying his father, Louis D'Ascoyne Mazzini (Dennis Price) vowed that he'd someday hold the familial title of Duke of Chalfont... and if he had to successively knock off eight relatives (each played by Alec Guinness, in a tour de force performance) with prior claim, then so be it. Wickedly funny black comedy from Ealing Studios also stars Valerie Hobson, Joan Greenwood, Hugh Griffith.