The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (PG)
three stars
Dir: John Madden
With: Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Richard Gere
Runtime: 122 minutes
TRULY there is nothing like a dame called Maggie. One makes the declaration after seeing the performance of Dame Maggie Smith in the sequel to the 2011 hit about a group of elderly Brits finding comfort and joy in their old age in a Jaipur hotel. To a concoction more sugary than a jam doughnut the size of Saturn, Dame Maggie of Downton Abbey brings some much needed vinegary wit and bittersweet poignancy.
Like the first guests of The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, one comes to the check-in desk of John Madden's movie with reservations. First, it is wonderful that cinema, inspired by the riches raked in by The King's Speech ($414 million/£270 million worldwide), has woken up to the power of the middle-aged pound. Cinemas should not be the sole preserve of fanboys catching the latest comic book reheat, parents parking their youngsters in front of a PG movie while the oldsters have a nap or, as in the case of Fifty Shades Of Grey, bewildered-looking hen parties wondering where all the sex has gone.
Patrons of a certain age and taste should be able to roam wider than the local arthouse cinema, and films such as Best Exotic, Calendar Girls, Mamma Mia, Quartet and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy have been successes as a result. While not specifically targeted to the grey pound, such movies do not say no to it in the same way, say, as a superhero movie or a teen rom-com.
That is the upside. The downside to such pictures, with the exception of Tinker Tailor, is that they can on occasion be so patronising and Home Counties it would fair make one's grey Scottish hair curl. That was the case with the first Best Exotic, which posited a vision of old age that was straight out of a BBC One sitcom of the 1970s, and the same tone can be found in the sequel. If they had carried on with The Good Life, this would be what Margo, Jerry, Tom and Barbara would be like in their twilight years.
Instead of Margo and company we have Judi (Dench), Bill (Nighy), Celia (Imrie), Richard (Gere), Ronald (Pickup) and of course Maggie (Smith). This time, the youngsters - Dev Patel, playing Sonny, the manager of the hotel, and his fiancee (Tina Desai) - are also joined by Tamsin Greig (Episodes, Green Wing, The Archers). Master of ceremonies is once again John Madden, a director skilled in middle-class crowd pleasing since his days making Shakespeare In Love and Mrs Brown, and Ol Parker is back on screenplay duties.
Parker piles in the plots and sub-plots, which range from the mundane (one character gets a job, and it is not customer relations in B&Q) to the brisk and businesslike (will Sonny buy another hotel, will an American chain get in on the act?), and the frankly bonkers (another character fears he may have unwittingly commissioned a "hit" on his girlfriend; as one does).
All of this thrashing around, while competently done, is not really what the audience has come to see. The Best Exotic, at its best, is a mood piece, a holiday in India for the eyes and mind. Instead of raging against this saccharine take on old age it is easier to kick back, enjoy the scenery and see some classy performers doing their collective thing, Dench and Nighy in particular as the will-they-won't-they couple, and Richard Gere, embracing his grey hair and inner oldie as he once embraced the ladies in American Gigolo.
It is all perfectly pleasant, like sitting at a pavement cafe watching the world go by. No more exciting, but no more troubling, than that. And while the wit in general is the stuff of old Punch magazines, Dame Maggie soars above the fray with some choice one-liners that would not be out of place dripping from the lips of the Dowager Duchess herself. She stoops, she conquers, she moves and she turns an otherwise humdrum movie into what will surely be another hit.
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