THREE years after delighting audiences with observations of a group of ageing Brit expats whose lives have followed varying paths, writer Ol Parker and director John Madden revisit them still living in the Indian hotel owned by Sunny (Dev Patel) whose business skills don’t match his ambition.

This time he’s in California seeking financing to renovate another run-down hotel. Much of the film deals with that ambition and the people sent by the financiers to review, clandestinely, the proposal on the ground.

The core cast remains unchanged from the original troupe. Maggie Smith, the former charlady who’s now assistant manager of the hotel; Judi Dench, now working for a merchandising company and Bill Nighy, the tourist guide yearning to take her in his arms; Celia Imrie the bundle of raging hormones in need of relief and Ronald Pickup the bachelor having a thing with a woman (Diana Hardcastle) who has no wish to remain celibate.

Newcomers are Richard Gere playing a writer whom Sunny believes is the undercover agent sent to evaluate his financial request and Tamsin Greig as a daughter waiting the arrival of her mother.

The film looks good. The plot is unburdened by insoluble issues. The dialogue is largely plebian with occasional one-liners of varying sharpness. The sparkle of the original has dimmed, its freshness has faded and its dramatic impetus has turned flaccid. In short, it’s a sequel showing the problems that bedevil most sequels.

At all cinemas