When John Madden assembles the cast of “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” in a line as they wait at the airport, he’s only Helen Mirren away from having gathered all of British acting royalty. He’s smart then to not place them in a dopey, dreck filled romantic comedy about octogenarians living it up in India.
“Marigold Hotel” is the best kind of coming-of-age, fish-out-of-water story: one that doesn’t create a bunch of embarrassing, sitcom-y stunts and one that doesn’t turn the whole movie into a travelogue.
It takes these seven elderly Brits out of England and places them in India because they are fed up with the life they’re leading as they hit pivotal stages near the end of their lives. For Evelyn (Judi Dench), her husband has just passed. For Graham (Tom Wilkinson), he’s given up on his job. Married couple Douglas and Jean (Bill Nighy and Penelope Wilson) are out of money, Norman and Madge (Ronald Pickup and Celia Irmie) are out of love, and Muriel (Maggie Smith) is out a hip.
What’s nice about their predicament is that they don’t particularly like India and never fully grow to it. Madden never idolizes the place, or for that matter Indians. Maggie Smith in particular plays an adorably racist older woman terrified to be operated on by Hindi doctors. We never even see the “money shot” of India or of the ramshackle hotel where they find themselves staying.
Because of this, the screenplay by Ol Parker never sends them on big, goofy adventures. Of course we have to see Smith eating disgusting, spicy food in front of a family of natives, Wilkinson playing cricket with local kids or Pickup dancing and slipping in the shower, but these are never the film’s main focal points. They’re one off jokes, and the movie is more interesting in the way it develops its characters.
Wilkinson’s surprise is that he’s a gay man with a heartbreaking past, Smith’s difficult personality is equaled out by her endearing presence and unhappy backstory, and Dench shows wonderful energy and range in a scene where she teaches a group of Indian telemarketers how they can improve.
Usually in a movie with a cast this large, it singles out one main character and peppers in some subplots, but all seven Brits and Dev Patel as the young hotel manager get equal screen time. Maybe all of these plots are then spread a little thin, but there are some good vibes here tinged with a solemn edge.
“Marigold Hotel” is a simple film about embracing change and overcoming the same, and although nothing about it is particularly radical, its approach is at least a welcome change of pace.
3 stars