I know I procrastinated to play Dragon age Inquisition and yes I am moving the weekend box office tomorrow I'm sorry. Anyway on to the review.
I never saw the first Best Exotic Marigold Hotel but I've heard it's pretty good. The Second Best Exotic Marigold hotel while watchable and enjoyable feels like eight different movies forced into one movie and no surprise they don't mesh that well.
The main thrust of the movie is that Dev Patel's Sonni is the owner of the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel which he runs with Maggie Smith's Mrs. Donnelly and in the last movie the hotel did so well they have decided to expand, the company they are looking out for a loan (I think) is impressed by them but want to make sure they are making a good investment so they send in a company worker disguised as a guest to inspect them at the same time Sonni is getting married to his long time girlfriend but complications ensue when a friend of the girlfriends brother (who is the son of a rival hotel owner) comes to mess things up. Happening in the background Bill Nighy's Douglas and Judi Dench's Evelyn are falling in love again with each other but are experiencing justified fears as to whether or not they should go about it at the same time Douglas's ex-wife and daughter re-enter the picture. Also Ronald Pickup's Norman is experiencing complications with his girlfriend Diana Hardcastle's Carol (the events of which are so convoluted and stupid I won't explain here.) Meanwhile Celia Imire's Madge is stuck between two men and Richard Gere's Guy Chambers falls in love with Sonni's mother Mrs. Kapoor. Also Mrs. Donnelly is dying.
Just reading that you should be able to tell what's wrong with this movie it is extremely bloated. It's basically an undercooked overstuffed Turkey that if they had trimmed the fat and cooked over longer it would have been delicious. Just one the of the eight plot lines would have made a good movie within itself. This is mostly the writers fault as except for one of them all of the storylines are rushed through and never given time to develop.
Due to this I couldn't really tell what this movie was about as in these kinds of stories where their are multiple plots going on their is usually a main theme connecting them together but their were SO many plots a few of them feeling as if they were from different movies all together. The characters suffer from the bad writing too as we really don't get to know any of them really, except for Sonni and his mom I couldn't really describe any of the other characters without saying the actor portraying them. Something that I felt was really missing from the movie was the relationships between these guys apart from their respective love interest and the bond between Sonni and Mrs. Donnelly which even that isn't given enough time to develop, I never got a sense Sonni was friends with any of the other people at the hotel. Bill Nighy prepares a speech for Sonni's wedding but he almost never interacts with him and Mrs. Donnelly and Evelyn only get one scene to talk to each other.
It's a shame because one of the movie's strengths is that everyone in this movie gives it one-hundred percent. Most of the cast is super charming and really funny. What otherwise would be trite and clichéd dialogue is suddenly the sweetest thing you've ever heard. Which is what makes the movie go from don't watch to watchable.
The movie is also really riddled with clichés especially in Madge and Sonni's plots. I love Dev Patel but oh my god Sonni was one of the most annoying characters I've ever seen and he chews the scenery every chance he gets. He's the only one of the cast who is genuinely bad in this movie. The best one is Maggie Smith who plays her role with a lot of sharp wit and a lot of dignity and is just a joy to watch. Another stand out is Lillete Dubey who plays Sonni's mom and is enjoyable to watch as well.
Due to how rushed this movie is you don't really care for what's going on. The only plot I did care for was the Bill Nighy and Judi Dench romance. I am a sucker for the finding love again after losing it stories and it's actually done very nicely and a lot of would-be clichés are done with dignity. If the movie would have been about that it would have been great.
I give this movie a 5/10~ The acting is for the most part is great and the movie is charming and funny enough to watch on demand but it's so bloated and rushed and definitely not worth theater prices.
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