The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel

It probably isn't a great idea to title a sequel the "second best" anything, in this case it's "The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" - the hit 2012 film about senior Brits retiring in India. Sequels are by their nature "second best;" so to imbed it in the film's title - "The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" is well, critical catnip.

What made the first film enjoyable was the novelty of its cross-cultural story line and the remarkable cast of over-60 British actors: Judi Dench, Maggie Smith, Bill Nighy, Penelope Wilton, Tom Wilkinson, Ronald Pickup, Celia Imrie, plus Millennial Dev Patel. Add gorgeous cinematography, its foreign settings and an engaging supporting cast and the first film had surprising appeal - like one of the British television series that turns up on Netflix that suddenly trends in the media.

That may be the place to see this new film, directed by John Madden (who also did the first). Not that there aren't reasons to see it in the theater - just the wedding sequence that ends the film explodes with color and vitality that would likely be diminished on the home screen. Still the basic problem with "The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel" is that it exists (like most sequels) because of the success of its predecessor, which surprisingly grossed $100 million dollars.

When that film ended, the Exotic Marigold Hotel had secured its place as the retirement home for these British ex-pats, which included Maggie Smith as the former housekeeper who has now become a co-manager of the hotel with Dev Patel. Any trace of her Raj-like attitudes towards Indians that defined her character in the first film are long gone; instead her thoughts have moved onto her mortality. But before the story moves into that treacly territory, Ol Parker's script follows what happens when Smith and Patel attempt to open a second Marigold hotel with the help of an international chain that specializes in elderly retirement homes.

In the film's brief prologue, Smith and Patel pitch their idea to an intrigued executive (a bemused David Strathairn), who agrees to pursue their request with the help of a mole he will send to the hotel for an inspection. When a suave Richard Gere arrives, Patel thinks he's the inspector, but could it be another guest - a middle-aged British tourist (played by Tamsin Greig)?

Gere claims to be an aspiring novelist and his DILF good looks immediately catch the eye of the hotel occupants, most notably the man-hungry Celia Imrie; but his attentions turn to Patel's elegant mother (Lillete Dubey). That relationship isn't the least of Patel's problems: his handsome cousin has swooped back into his life and picked up the dilapidated nearby hotel Patel wanted to make his second Marigold. He also appears hot on the trail of Patel's fiance (Tena Desae), who doesn't appear to fight off his advances.

Of the elders, Judi Dench must choose between a late-in-life career change and a growing romance with shy Bill Nighy. And self-styled lothario Ronald Pickup must decide between a relationship with Celia Imrie or with most females-over-fifty with whom he comes in contact. While the former plot line is delicately handled, largely due to the sensitivity of Dench and Nighy; the latter is a crude, obvious joke to the Cialis generation.

For her part, Smith trades her crabby old-school, working-class charwoman (with her bigoted attitudes) for a stoic woman dealing with her impending death. Part of makes her performance so affecting is how she does so much with so little: we don't need to know the doctor's prognosis when she leaves a doctor's office, her expression says it all.

But Patel also isn't well-served by the script, giving a wide-eyed performance that makes him appear to have studied at the Jerry Lewis School of Acting. Why anyone would have affection for his whiny character is the film's central mystery, but he more than redeems himself when he takes charge during the film's resplendent finale - his traditional wedding filmed in lush Bollywood style, which ends this by-the-numbers sequel on a high note.