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Tag: Judi Dench

Victoria and Abdul (2017)–An Imperial Friendship

In Victoria and Abdul the Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria (the majestic Judi Dench) is about to be celebrated in all its pomp and circumstance.  The year is 1887 and Queen Victoria is  sixty-eight years old. An honorary gold coin– a Mohur– has been minted as a token of appreciation from British-ruled India recognizing Victoria as the Empress of India.   Two Indians are conscripted to deliver the Mohur: Abdul (Ali Fazal) and Mohammed (Adeel Akhtar).    The early comedic scenes tease with the warm-hearted, kind and generous nature of an elderly...

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“Philomena”–The Story of a Mother’s Loss

It has been almost eleven years after the groundbreaking and award-winning film “The Magdalene Sisters” (2002), a fictionalized drama based on three young Irish women who survive the dehumanizing abuse as inmates of a Magdalene Sisters Asylum, one of many that existed in Ireland and other parts of the Catholic world in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.  Now, we have the remarkable and moving story of Philomena Lee, in the movie named after her, in which she searches for over fifty years for the little boy taken from her as a teenager. “Philomena”, nominated for...

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“The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel”–For the Elderly and Beautiful

Adapted from a novel, These Foolish Things, by Deborah Moggach, The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel is a finely nuanced film portraying seven British retirees:  a  widow (Judi Dench) whose late husband drove her into debt, a bigoted nanny/bookkeeper who is resigned to get a discounted hip replacement in India (Maggie Smith), retired judge (Tom Wilkinson) looking for his long lost lover, a sex fiend  bachelor Norman (Ronald Pickup),  a Blanche Dubois-type femme fatale (Celia Imrie), and a married couple who do not want to live in reduced circumstances in “senior living” (Bill Nighy and...

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