The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel is a new film (out in South Africa this Friday) based on Deborah Moggach’s novel These Foolish Things. It is a sweet, funny, feel-good movie, which targets an often-neglected audience, with issues pertinent to the ‘elderly and beautiful.’
The movie begins with Evelyn, (Dame Judi Dench) a recent widow, speaking to a woman from a call centre in India, who has no sensitivity or humanity in her tone, even when Evelyn reveals that her husband recently died. We then meet Muriel (Dame Maggie Smith), an extremely racist elderly woman in need of a hip operation, who shouts abuse from her wheelchair. We are introduced to each of the elderly stars in turn- we encounter, Graham (Tom Wilkinson), a well-known government official who attends his friend’s retirement party and makes an announcement of his own and Douglas (Bill Nighy) and Jean (Penelope Wilton) who recently lost all their retirement money investing in their daughter’s failed company. Norman (Ronald Pickup) is a lonely old, ladies- man who lies about his age on internet dating sites, and Madge (Celia Imrie) is a woman on the prowl, in search of an affluent husband and happiness.
Each of the elderly characters decides they can’t handle retirement in the UK, and when they come across an advert for the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel: for the elderly and beautiful, an up-market looking, and affordable paradise in India, they all immediately decide to relocate.
They arrive in India to find that the life of leisure they envisioned for themselves is somewhat of a myth- the hotel is run-down, a shadowy shell of its former self and India is ‘an assault on the senses,’- ‘nothing can prepare the uninitiated for this riot of noise and colour,’ Evelyn writes in her blog. Sonny, the hotel’s manager is an enthusiastic, ever- obliging, Kipling- quoting dreamer, who is determined to make something of himself and his hotel so that he can win his mother’s consent to his rebellious match with girlfriend, Sunaina.
The portrayal of India in this movie was the only part of it that I found somewhat disturbing. Every cliché in the book is there, and the Indian characters fall into all of the old colonial stereotypes, particularly Sonny who cannot manage his own life, and comes across as quite a foolish simpleton at times, in dire need of guidance from Evelyn and Muriel.
As the movie goes on relationships shift, secrets come out, and each of the character’s lives are transformed by their shared experiences. Graham goes in search of a lost love from his childhood, and is finally able to let go of the guilt he has been carrying since his youth. Evelyn gets a job in a call centre, teaching the employees to talk to their English clients, rather than at them, and embraces the Indian lifestyle, while grieving for her husband but encountering herself. Muriel has her hip operation and changes her perceptions when she connects with the serving girl who is from a lower caste. Douglas and Jean realize that some things don’t last and people change over time, Norman pretends he’s royalty and meets his match, and Madge learns to be happy on her own.
I spent a happy few hours watching this film, and I would recommend it, as it kept me chuckling and made me go ‘awww’ and had some moments which I found truly touching and profound.
‘Everything will be alright in the end. If it’s not alright, it’s not the end.’
Release Date: 23 March 2012
Runtime: 118 minutes
Director: John Madden
Cast: Bill Nighy, Celia Imrie, Dame Judi Dench, Dame Maggie Smith, Dev Patel, Lillete Dubey, Liza Tarbuck, Penelope Wilton, Ramona Marquez, Ronald Pickup, Tena Desae and Tom Wilkinson.
Genre: Comedy
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