Graham Greene’s Travels With My Aunt might be Greene’s drollest novels. This movie version, starring Maggie Smith, captures the cleverness of the book but adds some spice of its own. Maggie Smith, after her 1970 Oscar win for The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, takes on a completely different role in the outlandish Aunt Augusta. Directed with panache by George Cukor, with the adroit Alec McCowen as Maggie Smith’s bewildered nephew Henry, the screwball Travels with My Aunt will delight you with its madcap machinations. GRADE: A
Don’t think I’ve ever seen it.
TRAVELS WITH MY AUNT is well worthing reading and viewing, Patti. I enjoyed both the book and the movie version enormously.
I’ve never seen Maggie Smith in anything where she gave a bad performance. She was a hoot in this. We’ve been lucky enough to see her on stage three times (once in London, twice on Broadway) and she was great there too, even in the silliest of comedies.
I’m looking forward to THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL.
THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL is on our list, too, Jeff. Maggie Smith is one of my favorite actresses.
I mean, look at that cast!
Yes, the cast of THE BEST EXOTIC MARIGOLD HOTEL is a who’s-who of elderly actors, Jeff.
I am a huge fan of Greene’s work – in fact he was one of the first ‘serious’ writers that I gravitated towards in my teens, probably because he was so involved in movies from an early stage. I do like this one though the impression I always got was that Smith, national treasure that she is, was playing a role really written for Katharine Hepburn, who might have got away with the archness more easily, not least because Smith is clearly too young for the part. If she were to play it now though! McCowen is perfect as the nephew.
I think I read somewhere that Katherine Hepburn was offered the role, Sergio. When Hepburn turned it down, Maggie Smith, a hot commodity because of her Oscar, was next in line for the role.
I recently added this to my Netflix queue because I like Maggie Smith so much. Glad to read such praise of it, now it might just get moved up! The first time I saw Smith was in A Room with a View and it continues to be one of my favorite performances. She is so perfect in it.
I’m a big Maggie Smith fan, too, Carl. She’s great in every movie I’ve seen her in.