Review: The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel was an unexpected hit when it was released in 2012 due to its tapping into the greying demographic so often overlooked by Hollywood. As such, it should come as no surprise that the gang is reassembled for the straightforwardly titled The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel.

The film opens in San Diego where the hotel's enthusiastic co-owner and manager Sonny (Dev Patel) and business partner and hotel resident Muriel Donnelly (Maggie Smith) have come to meet with magnate Ty Burley (David Strathairn). The Marigold Hotel has become such a success that it's all but fully occupied, and Sonny and Muriel are looking to Burley to invest in their expansion plan. Burley agrees to consider their proposal, but his final decision hinges on the findings of an undercover hotel inspector his company will send to their establishment.

Expansion is not the only thing on Sonny's mind. There is the matter of his upcoming wedding to Sunaina (Tena Desai), who is more than a little miffed that her soon-to-be husband is more focused on hotel business than on learning their wedding dance. The presence of smoothly handsome and well-liked Kushal (Shazad Latif) puts a scare in Sonny but not enough as Sonny is busy bending over backwards to impress American walk-in guest Guy Chambers (Richard Gere), whom Sonny assumes to be Burley's secret inspector.

Meanwhile, Evelyn (Judi Dench) and Douglas (Bill Nighy) are still tiptoeing around the subject of romance though they are destined to be together. Playboy Norman (Ronald Pickup) seems to have found a woman (Diana Hardcastle) for whom he is seriously considering monogamy, but he may have accidentally put a hit out on her. Madge (Celia Imrie) is torn between two lovers, though that hardly prevents her from harmlessly flirting with Chambers who, much to Sonny's consternation, is very much interested in getting to know his mother Mrs. Kapoor (Lillete Dubey).

Returning screenwriter Ol Parker certainly stuffs the film with numerous narrative strands, though the film doesn't buckle under the weight of all the plot contrivances. Mainly because, for all intents and purposes, all that is required of Parker and director John Madden is to build a solid structure around their stars. The pleasure of the first film was in seeing all of these great British performers together. That pleasure was magnified because of the underlying reality that, vital as Dench and company may be in their seventies and eighties, there may be fewer and fewer opportunities to see them all grace the screen much less share the screen with one another.

With an eye on franchise continuation, the filmmakers have solidified Sonny's role as lynchpin. It is his hotel, of course, that allows all of these characters to gather together. New faces can be mixed in with the old, and these new faces will bring with them new stories to be told. In fact, one can even see the franchise flourishing as a television series, following in the footsteps of Arthur Hailey's Hotel, which ran for five seasons in the early Eighties.

For now, there is no time like the present and, as is said in the film, no present like time. So let us bask in the affection that Dench, Smith, Nighy, and the rest seem to genuinely have for one another. Let us enjoy the venerable Maggie Smith dispense zingers like, "Just because I'm looking at you when you talk, don't think I'm interested. Or even listening." Let us enjoy the wonderful Bill Nighy mumble and fumble while the delightful Penelope Wilton indulges her evil side. Let us be charmed by the hesitant dance between silver fox Richard Gere and the no-nonsense Lillete Dubey. Let us be wholly entertained by the unabashedly joyful dance number that has nearly all of the performers dusting off their dance moves.

The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel may be a trifle, but it's warm and comforting and filled with fantastic people. Sometimes that is all one can ask for.

The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

Directed by: John Madden

Written by: Ol Parker

Starring: Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, Dev Patel, Richard Gere, Celia Imrie, Ronald Pickup, Penelope Wilton, Diana Hardcastle, Lillete Dubey, Tena Desai, David Strathairn, Tamsin Greig