Mrs Brown Cannes Film Festival and released in the United Kingdom on 5 September 1997. Dench was nominated for many awards for her performance, including the Academy Award for Best Actress, but lost to Helen Hunt for her role in "As Good as It Gets". Several screens of text giving some background are shown before a bust is shown flying over a palace wall and shattering into countless pieces. The film shows the story of a bereaved Queen Victoria (Judi Dench) and her relationship with a Scottish servant, John Brown (Billy Connolly), and the subsequent uproar it provoked. Brown had been a
Edward Ponsonby, 2nd Baron Sysonby film "Mrs Brown" – who was Private Secretary to Queen Victoria. His great-grandfather was badly wounded at the Battle of Waterloo, but survived to become General Sir Frederick Ponsonby. The sister who helped nurse him back to health was Lady Caroline, better known to history under her married name of Lady Caroline Lamb as the wife of the future Prime Minister Lord Melbourne and lover of the poet Lord Byron. Lady Caroline was also a key figure in the film "Lady Caroline Lamb" – played by Sarah Miles – in 1972. The father of the two siblings, Edward's great-great-grandfather, was