Director John Madden
Staring Dev Patel, Bill Nighy, Maggie Smith, Richard Gere, Judi Dench
Rated PG
Score 5/6

As the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel has only a single remaining vacancy – posing a rooming predicament for two fresh arrivals – Sonny pursues his expansionist dream of opening a second hotel.

As we all know, a movie sequel always has difficult job following the original movie and I suppose that’s why I only read a few lines at most of the online reviews that I noticed online. The most notable of the reviews that I noticed suggest that this was a daft but good-natured sequel. I kind of got the impression that they were only half right the movie certainly isn’t daft. It should be noted that this predictable but predictable in a good way and I found myself laughing out loud on more than one occasion.
For those of you who are wondering the characters for this franchise where created by English writer Deborah Moggach in her 2004 novel These Foolish Things. Director John Madden is exactly a familiar name to me though it turns out I have watched a few of his movies. Madden delivered something that was really worth watching and it was good to see that he got the chance to show us more of India in the second movie.
Maybe I should have taken the time to refresh my memory with the Best Exotic Marigold Hotel before going to see this one but that really wasn’t necessary and those of you who haven’t watched the original movie won’t find yourself lost. It was great to see that Tena Desae’s role as Sonny’s girlfriend was expanded in the second movie along with the role of Sonny’s mother. Playing against so much seasoned talent Dev Patel really had the opportunity to shine in this one.