Britain is a country where old men say "Goodbye" to Diane Cilento with memories of the beautiful woman they lusted after when they were boys

Diane Cilento has died at the age of 78.
I was 16 years old in 1963 and Diane Cilento was 30 when she played 'Molly Seagrim', who seduced Albert Finney as 'Tom Jones' in the film 'Tom Jones' and was nominated for an Oscar for her performance.

Things you possibly didn't know about Diane, that she :

* was born in Brisbane Australia, daughter of physicians, Sir Raphael and Lady Phyllis Cilento who, much to their initial disappointment, she didn't follow into the medical profession, but won a scholarship to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London, at the age of 17 and started to get parts in film, theatre and television. parts.



* got her first leading part in 1955, at the age of 22, in 'Passage Home', the only woman on a cargo ship from South America to London where her sultry presence got the crew all steamed up, especially Captain Peter Finch and First Mate Anthony Steele.


* after several forgettable films, played Molly Seagrim in Tom Jones, where, in a dark wig and exuding vitality, she was the first of many women to seduce the young eighteenth century hero.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tezjznL9NzM&feature=related*



* in 1957 met, then married Sean Connery and then made a brief sortie into Hollywood which started in 1965 with Carol Reed's 'The Agony and The Ecstasy', in which, as the Countess de Medici, she encouraged Charlton Heston's 'Michelangelo' to finish painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel.
















* in 1967, as a widowed landlady, starred opposite Paul Newman in the western,'Hombre' and then back in Britain made the cult film, 'The Wicker Man', in 1973 having fun as the schoolteacher on a pagan Scottish island, who upsets the repressed religious police sergeant by her teaching her girl pupils about phallic symbols.

Singing with Christopher Lee :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krpjL91U_DE

* after her divorce from Sean Connery, returned to Australia, played in the theatre and in 1980s, settled in Queensland and built her own outdoor amphitheatre in the rainforest called the Karnak Playhouse.

* played the mother of her real-life son, Jason Connery in her last film in Australia, 'The Boy Who Had Everything' in 1985.

Diane talking about points in her life :
http://www.australianbiography.gov.au/subjects/cilento/videos/1/

Australian news remembering Diane :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J849UiTiL-c