‘Bombshell’

Controversial Hollywood star Hedy Lamarr was more than a glamorous beauty – she was also a genius inventor.

Fleeing Vienna and a loveless marriage with the threat of war, Hedwig Kiesler eventually found her way to Hollywood and the world’s most beautiful woman tagline promoted by all powerful studio head, Louis B. Mayer. She had some success in the 1940s but, outspoken, her career went into decline in the early ’50s.

But it’s her spare time interests and ideas that have had massive impact – her frequency-hopping radio signal patent that was scandalously ignored during the war yet years later developed with no official recognition for Lamarr. The principles of her theory are to be found in wifi, internet, GPS and CDMA.

Directed by Alexandra Dean (This Is Paris, Secrets of Playboy), Bombshell is an engrossing, warts-and-all exploration of the moving life of a Golden Age Hollywood actress overlooked by the studios but also marginalised by her adopted country. Based on believed-lost cassette taped recordings, Lamarr herself talks of days gone by.

Rating: 64%