The best exotic Marigold Hotel (2011)

an ensemble cast consisting of Judi Dench, Celia Imrie, Bill Nighy, Ronald Pickup, Maggie Smith, Tom Wilkinson and Penelope Wilton, as a group of British pensioners moving to a retirement hotel in India, run by the young and eager Sonny, played by Dev Patel.

Gets 78% & 79% in Rotten Tomatoes. About right. Wilkinson charcater is very well portrayed. Patel's seems a stereotype that nearly drowns in syrup. Ebert liked it. As did Stephen Holden in the Times: The screenplay does a reasonably skillful job of interweaving its subplots and of creating some mild surprises. This is a programmatically feel-good movie whose tempered optimism and insistence that it’s never too late to leave your comfort zone and explore new horizons stays mostly (but not always) on the safe side of sentimentality. Besides its sterling cast, its ace in the hole is its pungent depiction of Jaipur’s teeming streets, which give an otherwise well-mannered movie a blinding splash of color.

Crazy, stupid, love

A fun film. Originally skeptical that I would be watching another sappy love story (and ready to leave after short interval), I was utterly surprised by the film, and how much I liked it.

Steven Carrel (unpleasant memories of watching a very small bit on an "Office" episode did not come back to me at first, for I was not quite sure it was him playing Cal) plays a husband who is blindsided by his wife while they are pondering what dessert to order; rather than agreeing to split a sweet she says I want a divorce. She (played nicely by Julianne Moore) has decided that, after 25 years of marriage, and hitting her forties, she needs something different. She also announced she has "slept with David Lindhagen" (played with some understatement by Kevin Bacon; that name becomes something of a tagline).

Ryan Gosling plays Jacob, a womanizer who, sick of hearing Cal complain about being cuckolded by David Lindhagen, decides to remake Cal into the man who he might never have been, but should be. Gosling holds back from doing a parody of the Casanova who scores with ease (an interesting aspect of his conquests is that he catches not just white women, but also black women; of course, this being a movie, almost of all of them have gorgeous bodies and are attractive).

Emma Stone plays a woman who is about to become a lawyer, and whom Jacob hits on early on in the film. She rebuffs his advance, and goes back to hoping that the lawyer she's dating will propose marriage to her. Her friend, Liz, tells her to stop playing it safe, to stop going for PG-13, and to loosen up and live.

There are various other characters that work: Cal's 13 year old son, in love with a 17 year old babysitter, who in turn is in love with Cal. And there are twists: the first woman whom Cal hits on and scores with (played with aplomb and plenty of cleavage by Maria Tomei), turns out to be his son's teacher.

The films works, is fun, and I enjoyed it quite very much.

Brick Lane

A young Blangadeshi is sent to England to marry a man older than her, and leaves behind her sister, an irascible father, and memories of her mother drowning herself, and of happy times playing with her sister.

In London she lives with her two daughters and distant husband in an immense block apartment building that houses immigrants and others on the margins of society. After her husband quits his job in a fit of pique motivated by a perceived insult to his character and intelligence, she buys a sewing machine and begins making garments and money.

She lives for the letters her sister writes of her romantic adventures. As she reads such letters, Nazneen is transported back to her youth and her home.

Karim delivers her the raw materials and picks up her finished work is also Bangladeshi. Slowly a friendship develops between them. Her husband's indifference (his only tenderness, if it can be called that, is to take her hand in bed, before climbing on her and discharging his desire) pushes her away, and Karim's tenderness slowly seduces her.

When 9/11 happens the slow radicalization of Asian youth is propelled by the racist backlash of whites screaming invective and threatening violence ("go home, Paki" they scream, but never think that perhaps the colonialism of the homeland is, at least, partly responsible for the immigration of those they loathe).

Subtlety in storytelling renders this film weak; it could use a shot of adrenaline. Yet it is a beautiful film that tells an important and compelling story.

Rachel getting married

Anne Hathaway and Rosemarie DeWitt star in this eclectic movie. The music is unusual, and wonderful.


Kym (Anne Hathaway) is released from rehab for a few days so she can go home to attend the wedding of her sister Rachel (Rosemarie DeWitt). At home, the atmosphere is strained between Kym and her family members as they struggle to reconcile themselves with her past and present. Kym's father shows intense concern for her well-being and whereabouts, which Kym interprets as mistrust. She also resents her sister's choice of her best friend Emma (Anisa George), rather than Kym, to be her maid of honor. Rachel, for her part, resents the attention her sister's addiction is drawing away from her wedding, a resentment that comes to a head at the rehearsal dinner, where Kym, amid toasts from friends and family, takes the microphone to offer an apology for her past actions, as part of her twelve-step program.

Married life

Seeing a review of a new film in the Times, starring Rachel McAdams, Harrison Ford and Diane Keaton, I decided to get films with McAdams. This is one. An added attraction, for me, was the presence of Chris Cooper.

Chris Cooper's character, Harry Allen, is married, but has fallen in love with Kay  Nesbitt (Rachel McAdams), herself a young widow. harry's best friend, Richard Langley (Pierce Brosnan), narrates the film and (eventually) steals Kay from Harry. Unwilling to hurt his wife, Pat (Patricia Clarkson), Harry decides to kill her by poisoning the powder she takes nightly for her regularity or headaches. However, Pat herself is having a fling with a neighbor from the country where they have a cottage.

It sort of works. Somehow, though, it feels as if Chris Cooper is not quite stretched out, though he does do a good job. Brosnan is good, as well, as are Clarkson and McAdams. Yet, there is a but...

Brief Encounter

Watched film in two parts: started it last Thursday evening, finished it last evening (before watching Mrs. Palfrey yet again).
Rather slow. Melodramatic. Yet I managed to enjoy it. Rachmaninoff's

Piano Concerto No. 2  played by Eileen Joyce, runs through the film.

Trevor Howard and Celia Johnson

Shoot the Moon

What a depressing movie. Good acting, about human beings at some of their worst. Enough to turn me, were I younger and more naive, against marriage, and men.

Having beenreleased in 1982, an interesting aspect of it is to look at where the actors are now. Diane Keaton and Albert Finney are, of course, very successful and renown actors. The girls who played the daughters: Dana Hill, who played the oldest, Sherry, died of diabetes complications at age 32; Viveka Davis, who played Jill, the very cute next oldest, best I can determine was about 10, 11, when she made the film, and has had a lot of work across the years (apparently, though, having made nothing since 2001); Tracey Gold, who played Marianne, already had a number of credits and went on to have many more, including playing on the series "Growing Pains"; and Tina Yothers, who played the youngest daughter, Molly, had a few more roles, and wound up playing Jennifer Keaton in the series "Family Ties" for 7 years.

Paul Newman dead at age 83

3 different stories on this great actor and liberal activist from the Times, Journal and NY Daily News.