The Leisure Seeker (2018)

I honestly thought The Leisure Seeker would be something different than it was. I thought it would be a charming little film about how old people are people too and makes us laugh at them while simultaneously making us adore the lovely old people. The Leisure Seeker doesnt do that. This film goes to some hard places about how much getting old sucks, how little younger generations can understand the experience of getting older, and it truly invests its characters with real agency, real sexuality, real humanity. This is not the Marigold Hotel or Bucket The Bucket List. Not to say there is anything wrong with those films. This is just something different.

Helen Mirren and Donald Southerland are both amazing in these roles and add to the power of the film. The Leisure Seeker doesnt pull punches and neither do they in their performances. Being old in this century is a different reality than ever before and The Leisure Seeker does a good job with exploring that.

None of this is to say the film isn’t entertaining. While the film might not focus on being a crowd pleaser that does not mean The Leisure Seeker isn’t fun to watch. Mirren and Southerland are charismatic as well as talented thespians and watching them is completely satisfying. The fil does give us many good laughs along with the honest tears it generates. It was refreshing to see a film treat its older characters with as much respect as their younger equivalents.

The Leisure Seeker
Starring: Helen Mirren, Donald Sutherland
Director: Paolo Virzi
Writers: Francesca Archibugi, Francesco Piccolo, Stephen Amidon, Paolo Virzi