Here we have the follow-up to 2012’s geriatric comedy
smash-hit The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel,
featuring a stunning array of British talent. With the hotel now firmly
established, owner Sonny (Dev Patel) and hotel resident Muriel (Maggie Smith)
hope to expand into a franchise, and before long American hotel inspector Guy
(Richard Gere) is dispatched to observe and report. In the midst of this
disruption, Sonny is also planning on his forthcoming wedding to Sunaina (Tina
Desai), and love appears to be blossoming between old hands Douglas (Bill
Nighy) and Evelyn (Judi Dench).
The reason the set-up for this film just took almost 100
words to explain is because the plot has so many tangents and off-shoots that
it’s often very difficult to keep up or even be bothered to care, which is a
real shame considering the gentle charm and warm humour of the original. Besides
a weird lack of colour in the visuals, half the cast look too bored to care and
the laugh test is failed spectacularly.
A substantial lack of laughs is the least of the problems
however, as the film manages to commit a double-helping of cardinal sins by
making Bill Nighy very dull to watch and Dev Patel annoying to listen to. Even Richard
Gere doing the Richard Gere thing (silver hair, big chin, bobbing head etc.)
feels like a burst of fresh air amongst a once loveable cast of characters who
have become old and tired before their time. Of course, it is impossible for
Judi Dench to be anything but magnetic, and she is by far and away the most
enjoyable and seemingly ageless presence whilst the film withers around her.
There is at least a mild effort at rampant energy towards
the latter half, even amongst the painfully stretched asides about the pains
and fears of prolonged age, but in an attempt to be deep, it just becomes
hollow. The poster claims ‘some things are worth the wait’…this wasn’t.
