Lady Godiva of Coventry (1955)

★ 5.3 1h 29m IMDb

Drama History

Fictionalized account of events leading up the famous nude ride (alas, her hair covers everything) of the militant Saxon lady.

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Cast

Maureen O'Hara as Lady Godiva Died 2015 · Ranelagh, County Dublin, Ireland Maureen O'Hara (born Maureen FitzSimons, August 17, 1920 - died October 24, 2015) was a native Irish and naturalized American actress and singer, and a natural redhead, who became successful in Hollyw...

George Nader as Lord Leofric Died 2002 · Pasadena, California, USA George Garfield Nader, Jr. (October 19, 1921 – February 4, 2002) was an American actor and writer of Lebanese descent. He appeared in a variety of films from 1950 to 1974, including Sins of Jezebel (1...

Victor McLaglen as Grimald Died 1959 · Stepney, East London, England, UK Victor McLaglen was a British-American film actor. He was known as a character actor, particularly in Westerns, and made seven films with John Ford and John Wayne. McLaglen won the Academy Award for B...

Rex Reason as Harold Died 2015 · Berlin, Germany Rex Reason was an American actor born on November 30, 1928, in Berlin, Germany, to American parents. He grew up in Los Angeles and initially had no acting aspirations, but his mother encouraged both h...

Torin Thatcher as Lord Godwin Died 1981 · Bombay, British India, India From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Torin Thatcher (15 January 1905 - 4 March 1981) was an English actor born in Bombay, British India, India), to English parents. He was an imposing, powerfully bu...

Director Arthur Lubin

Cast Maureen O'Hara, George Nader, Victor McLaglen, Rex Reason, Torin Thatcher, Eduard Franz, Leslie Bradley, Arthur Shields, Robert Warwick, Arthur Gould-Porter

r96sk 7/10 Jan 06, 2022

It feels rushed, but I kinda do like <em>'Lady Godiva of Coventry'</em>.

The film, in my opinion, is at its best with Maureen O'Hara and George Nader alongside the trio of would-be prisoners, spearheaded by Victor McLaglen. The stuff with that quintet was really enjoyable to me; the main story isn't even to do with them.

The plot of this 1955 involves the characters of O'Hara and Nader, but with Leslie Bradley & Co. Those parts of the film aren't the strongest and don't really leave a sizeable imprint. I would've preferred a production with those other five more, to be honest. It's all still watchable though. There's a couple of neat shots scattered in there, also.

I managed to spot Clint Eastwood in his uncredited minor role. Much bigger things to come for that man, I reckon...

CinemaSerf 6/10 Sep 20, 2022

This is my kind of movie - a good old historical drama set in 11th Century England. Sadly, though, the whole thing is just too episodic and disjointed for the story to ever really flow. It sets out do depict the tale of the eponymous lady (Maureen O'Hara) who rode naked through the streets of Coventry (draped in "Rapunzel"-esque locks that appear nowhere else on her head in the film!) to draw the attention of her Norman husband "Leofric" (George Nader) to the plight of the commons as the Norman and Saxon peoples of this now divided land start to draw battle lines. Her husband has already fallen foul of King Edward I (Eduard Franz) by refusing to marry his chosen bride, so the couple soon find their allies at court are few, and goaded by the duplicitous "Godwin" (Torin Thatcher) things are soon simmering perilously close to insurrection. Though rooted in fact, this plays fast and loose with just about everything from the history to the characterisations. Thatcher exudes a soupçon of menace, but the rest of the cast really appear to be going through the motions with this colourful, and at times energetic (largely thanks to Victor McLaglen), enterprise. Nobody could ever describe O'Hara as especially versatile - here she is just playing her usual determined and feisty character and though she isn't bad, it's all just the same role she has played against an array of more famous leading men in years gone by. Fans of the men-in-tights genre ought to enjoy it well enough, I did, but it's all pretty unremarkable fayre I'm afraid.