‘Old Age’ Films: Golden Retirement, Dispossession and Disturbance

Dolan, Josephine ORCID: 0000-0002-7669-9060 (2016) ‘Old Age’ Films: Golden Retirement, Dispossession and Disturbance. Journal of British Cinema and Television, 13 (4). pp. 571-589. doi:10.3366/jbctv.2016.0341

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Abstract

In its reliance on old age protagonists and storylines and a cohort of pensionable actors, an emerging cycle of British films (including Last Orders (2001), Iris (2001), The Mother (2003), The Queen (2006), The Iron Lady (2011), Quartet (2012) along with The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (2012) and its 2015 sequel) addresses many concerns related to the ageing population and ‘crisis of ageing’ discourse, whilst projecting certain troubling ideologies. In the play between cultural and generic verisimilitude, these films illuminate the inclusions and exclusions of the Thatcherite, neo-liberal, golden retirement dream in both pre- and post-crash contexts, whilst storylines and actors' ongoing careers combine to normalise the deferred retirement policies and extended working lives resulting from the 2008 banking crisis. This article argues that these films both utilise and disturb dominant stereotypes of old age. However, in turn, these disturbances are troublingly neo-colonialist, heteronormative and postfeminist.

Item Type:	Article
Article Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	British cinema, heteronormative narratives, neo-colonial representations, ‘old age’ films, retirement, stardom and ageing; REF2021
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > H Social Sciences (General)
Divisions:	Schools and Research Institutes > School of Creative Arts
Research Priority Areas:	Culture, Continuity, and Transformation Creative Practice and Theory
Depositing User:	Anne Pengelly
Date Deposited:	16 Mar 2018 14:39
Last Modified:	04 Feb 2022 12:31
URI:	https://eprints.glos.ac.uk/id/eprint/5500

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