by Elizabeth Taylor (DVD) Rated b
Amazon Blurb:
Mrs. Palfrey is recently widowed and decides to move to a small hotel in London to spend her last years as a lady of independence. The Claremont is a crumbling old edifice that serves as a retirement home for a small but fascinating group of tenants. Mrs. Palfrey meets her fellow 'inmates' at dinner, and announces that she has a grandson who will be calling on her at times. Yet despite multiple attempts her grandson Desmond doesn't respond and Mrs. Palfrey realizes she has entered a world of loneliness.
Out on an errand she falls and is befriended by a handsome young busker/writer Ludovic Meyer who nurses her leg wound, makes her tea, and escorts her home. Ludo is a loner and also lonely and when Mrs. Palfrey offers him dinner at the hotel he gladly accepts. But at the hotel the guests presume that Mrs. Palfrey's guest will be her grandson Desmond. Mrs. Palfrey hastily informs Ludo that she has erred and Ludo agrees to pose as her grandson. The guests at the hotel are charmed by Ludo, and Mrs. Palfrey and Ludo grow increasingly bonded - they share many likes and tastes and meld into a beautiful relationship that would be the envy of any grandmother and grandson. Mrs. Palfrey's loneliness is dissipated by Ludo and the effect is vice versa. How the two progress to the end of the film, finding new lives from old ones, forms the immensely touching finale to the film.
My Comments: I watched this over the weekend. I thought it was a very beautiful but bittersweet movie. I loved how the relationship of Mrs. Palfrey and Ludo progressed but the atmosphere of the Clairmont and the
situation of the residents made me very sad.
