No Vacancy

by Thomas Willett

1:00pm PST, May 17, 2012

With movie season blasting into summer, it is time for fast paced action films and broad comedies to oversaturate the market. What about those outside the demographic? Where is their alternatives? For the elderly, director John Madden’s latest, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, has their money, if just because of sparse competition. The tale of senior citizens traveling to India and residing at the titular hotel sounds like a dull afternoon. Does Madden manage to make the anemic concept and turn it into The Darjeeling Limited for the older crowd?

The movie manages to bring together a delightful cast of British actors, including Judi Dench, Tom Wilkinson, Bill Nighy, and Maggie Smith, all of whom are established enough to give the heavily understated script extra momentum. While Dench is the narrator, the story rarely follows an actor for more than five minutes at a time to get a sense of who they are. By the first hour, there is a raw skeleton formed to give them a personality, but not enough to make them distinguishable. While many plots revolve around death, homosexuality, and trying new things, they all blur together in a way that keeps one performer from being the stand out.

While the movie lacks high stakes, it attempts to create interest through subtle themes about growing older. A lot of these ideas are clever, but become a nuisance due to the lack of ulterior motives. There is little interaction with the foreign city to justify significance. The one exception is the young clumsy hotel owner, Sonny (Dev Patel), who brings a youthful charm to the stagnant and cynical leads. It is acceptable that the action isn’t thrilling because of the story, but it’s not okay to meander for two hours and ponder life. There needs to be more substance.

Another flaw of the movie is that composer Thomas Newman’s Bollywood-oriented score rarely fits tonally with the scene. In moments where the characters give dramatic speeches, it is underplayed by ridiculous harmonies. The score’s only achievement is capturing the country’s music into ominously competent background noise. Most of the times, it only makes things feel campy and takes away from the drama. Unlike the action, the music should have been used more sparingly.

Despite the slow pace, the actors manage to give their all. Maggie Smith and Bill Nighy are especially charming and the most memorable characters. While they are given the simple gimmicks of being a wheelchair-bound xenophobe and a cheerful handyman, respectively, they give these characters enough personality to make their experiences seem amusing. They become the most interesting characters also because it feels like they were given the most material to work with. Most of the supporting cast has their moments, but due to the massive amount of leads, it is impossible to spend too much time with one party.

This movie manages to join the elderly escapism genre of movies in a very clunky fashion. It may bring insight to the later years of life, but not without crowding it with way too many characters and a lack of overall goals. These characters look to have fun as retirees, but it doesn’t translate to the screen very well. If it managed to cut down to a smaller, more central cast and a more developed plot, then maybe this could have worked. For now we get a bunch of older Brits getting paid to hang out.

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel is flawed and unfocused with too many characters. While it may appeal to the elderly crowd, it lacks the charm and ingenuity to appeal to anyone else. Unlike films like The Way, it doesn’t explore anything new in a way deserving of a film. However, with decent performances by Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, and Dev Patel, there is enough charm to keep this from being a total waste.