The Assam Garden **** (1985, Deborah Kerr, Madhur Jaffrey, Alex McCowen, Zia Mohyeddin, Iain Cuthbertson Anton Lesser, Ronald Russell) – Classic Movie Review 6164

Director Mary McMurray’s tender and poignant 1985 drama brings back Deborah Kerr to the cinema after a 16-year layoff (since The Arrangement in 1969) as Englishwoman Helen, an ex-Raj widow who returns to England and the Imperial-style garden her husband had planted, and makes friends and bonds with her Indian neighbour, Ruxmani (Madhur Jaffrey).

Despite the slightly undernourished budget and script (by Elisabeth Bond), the highly rewarding playing makes this film a sensitive, civilised and richly enjoyable little entertainment. It is hard to imagine a stampede at the box office for it, but it is invaluable as a cultured pleasure. Satisfyingly, it is a film about tea and sympathy, the title of an earlier Kerr movie.

Kerr and Jaffrey are superb in subtle, beautifully detailed, and affecting performances, and the support performances by Alex McCowen, Zia Mohyeddin, Iain Cuthbertson Anton Lesser, Ronald Russell, and Daisy Bell are good too.

It is shot by Bryan Loftus, produced by Nigel Stafford Clark and scored by Richard Harvey.

It was Kerr’s last cinema feature, though she made two more TV movies the following year, before her death on 16 October 2007, age 86. She was nominated for six Oscars as Best Actress in Edward, My Son (1949), From Here to Eternity (1953), The King and I (1956), Heaven Knows, Mr Allison (1957), Separate Tables (1958) and The Sundowners (1960).

Her other notable films include The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1943), Black Narcissus (1947), The End of the Affair (1955), Tea and Sympathy (1956) An Affair to Remember (1957), Bonjour Tristesse (1958), The Grass Is Greener (1960), The Innocents (1961) and The Night of the Iguana (1964).

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 6164

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