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Review

Peter O'Toole plays Maurice, who rattles around London with his thespian cohorts, picking up small TV acting gigs to make ends meet even while approached by starry-eyed fans who remember his glory days. With his friends Ian (Leslie Phillips) and Donald (Richard Griffiths), they are the epitome of codger rapscallions. They trade their medications as they share caustic, witty banter in the local coffee shop; their advanced age does not prohibit heated exchanges and an occasional stab at fisticuffs.

Ian, something of a hypochondriac, has his grandniece Jessie (Jodie Whittaker) sent to care for him. She's unschooled and rude and not an ideal candidate for caretaker. Country-bred and rough-hewn, she wants to be a model. Ian finds her nerve-racking, but Maurice is enthralled. He initiates a Pygmalionesque connection: He takes her to the theater and she takes him to clubs. Her vibrant youth rekindles the pansexual libertine's sensuality. As the body ages and breaks down and the soul suffers increasing indignities, the pleasures of the flesh can still be recalled — enjoyed as memories evoked by the scent of a woman’s neck or the curve of her foot.

Maurice starts wrapping up loose ends and making amends. He visits wife Valerie (Vanessa Redgrave), whom he treated shabbily; and attempts to reconcile other, current rifts and to ameliorate extant wounds. He visits places that he loves, and meets the future without pretense or illusion.

Director Michell (Notting Hill, Changing Lanes) gives the assembled luminaries their head, and has crafted an intelligent and unsentimental examination of a lion in winter. Whittaker holds her own in a pretty heavy-duty acting ensemble, allowing Jessie to grow and deepen as she experiences a life she couldn’t have imagined for herself. The troupers move through the story as one, with natural grace; and O'Toole commands the screen with the same authority he showed as Lawrence of Arabia or Jack, the 14th Earl of Guerney. If this should be O'Toole's last piece of work, it can hold the weight.

 -- Ann Yarabinee