Per chance I saw this film recently on UK TV. I looked and thought 'oh my god' these are well known people in it, looked at the cast and spotted Helen Mirren. 1969 - acting as a naive young lady with her only ambition to get $100 and move to Brisbane and become a hairdresser. Good Aussie accents and so nicely played and related I have to say. It made me smile that she was happy underwater naked however when told to take her dress off standing in it, there was a 'novel' expression. The entry of the awful 'intruder' (so called friend) was the only thing IMHO that berated the whole film. The man was / is both obnoxious and annoying (otherwise 10 points!).This is a film needing a lot of audience 'perception'. It's like an old version of 'Lost in Translation' where you need to think beyond the film and imagine the realities where it's exposed at the very end with the frolicking (heck that words reflects my age!) manner in the water. 'Lost in Translation' reflected the same as 'silent whispers'.All in all a delightful film with a perceptive storyline of 'innocence' on both sides. An older man with a younger woman depicted in a believable 'not cheesy, manipulative nor degrading' manner. Certainly a 'must see'!Michael

Michael Powell, the famed British director best known as half of the famous Powell and Pressburger filmmaking team, was certainly in a rut in the late 1960s. After the vicious press response to his 1960 progressive serial killer thriller Peeping Tom, it was near impossible for him to make a film in England again. Nine years later, he found hope in a small production with James Mason, one of the most respected of British actors, to be shot in Australia. The story could not have been more fitting.Age of Consent tells the story of an artist disconnected from himself and his art. Having been a success, he feels aimless and almost without passion. His solution is to move to a small shack on the coast of the Great Barrier Reef and attempt to renew his interest in painting and eventually life itself. Aside from the collection of unique characters surrounding him, he finds a catalyst for retribution in Cora, a young, sweet but determined young girl who longs to escape from her non-idyllic paradise in which she is controlled by a gin-swilling, ungrateful grandmother who sees her only as the second coming of her mother, the former town prostitute.What is really great about this film, aside from the gorgeous color cinematography that captures impeccably the grandiose beauty of Australia, is the story of the reawakening of the artist. Certainly this had to inspire Powell, who was himself in need of an awakening and perhaps felt a connection with Bradley Morahan. To his credit, he directs very fine, perhaps not to the degree of perfection as earlier films like The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, 49th Parallel or The Red Shoes, but for such a film as it is he holds it at a fine pace while also keeping our interest as we watch a man push aside all distractions in search of the return of his passion for art and life. Some feel since this is not in the pantheon of great Powell and Pressburger films that it is mostly dismissive. I disagree. Powell shows us here the need and desire artists have to create and the pains necessary to fulfill that urge. While not of historical or national importance as his earlier films, this is certainly a memorable late career achievement for Michael Powell. If you like his more famous films, this is one to check out if only to understand how an artist becomes rejuvenated.

I recently took part ( along with 400 other people ) in a charity skinny dip on the Welsh coast. To prepare for the experience, I re-watched this 1969 movie, which not only stars but was produced by the late, great James Mason. Based on Norman Lindsay's book, 'Age Of Consent' is about an ageing artist called 'Bradley Morahan' who realises he is running out of ideas, and so travels to an offshore island in Australia. There he meets the beautiful ( and boy is she ) 24 year old 'Cora Ryan' ( Helen Mirren ), who lives with her domineering mother ( Neva Carr-Glynn ). Like 'Humbert Humbert' ( the character he played in Stanley Kubrick's 'Lolita' ), Bradley becomes infatuated with the young woman. But Ma Ryan is having none of it, insisting ( despite evidence to the contrary ) that Cora is under the age of consent...Directed by the brilliant Michael Powell ( his first picture since the delightful 'fish out of water' comedy 'They're A Weird Mob' ), this is a lovely, relaxing sort of film which makes you smile rather than laugh. Much of the humour comes from Irish actor Jack MacGowran as Bradley's oddball chum 'Nat Ryan'. It is sad to think he passed away only a few years after it was made. Also good value - and as sexy as Mirren in her own way - is Andonia Katsaros as overweight widow 'Isabel Marley'. After shooting was completed, she emigrated to the U.K., where she appeared in a string of sitcoms such as 'Rising Damp' and 'Two's Company'.Mason is as excellent as ever but its Mirren's film. The shots of her swimming nude are incredible to look at, not just titillating but genuinely gorgeous. I wish I'd been a friend of hers back then! The music on the version I have is by Stanley Myers but I understand it was not Powell's original choice for a soundtrack. I have not heard the original, but Myers' music is lush, particularly during the aforementioned nude scenes.When first shown on I.T.V. in the late '70's, the film was screened as part of a series called 'For Adults Only', meaning I had to wait several years to see it. I wonder what Mirren makes of the picture now, given its theme of an old man trying to recapture lost youth by pursuing a beautiful young woman it probably would not go down too well today. Perhaps she should star in a remake, doing the nude swimming while wearing a crown!

The British-Australian film 'Age of Consent' was released in 1969 - the same year as the publication of the semi-autobiographical novel of the same name on which it was based, and also the death of its author, the well known Australian artist Norman Lindsay. It appears to have once been released briefly in some North American cinemas but only in a heavily bowdlerised version with its playing time significantly cut. Until last year no DVD was available in North America although one was released in Australia in 2005, and until the film was shown on the TCM TV channel I did not even remember that it existed. The long delay in marketing it here seems a pity as it was a very enjoyable and rewarding film to view, but it is now part of a double label disk (with 'Stairway to Heaven') released by Sony which I recommend unreservedly to all IMDb users who are interested. It will probably appeal particularly to those viewers who also enjoyed 'Sirens', a better known film also featuring incidents from the life of the same Australian artist.The theme - a talented but burnt out artist taking a break from his regular lifestyle to recharge his batteries, and becoming re-energised through a chance friendship formed with a young person from a very different background - is somewhat hackneyed, but with a good cast it can still be very effective. James Mason, as Bradley Monahan gave one of the great performances of his career playing a jaded 60 year old Australian painter who returns from New York to an isolated island on the Great Barrier reef off the Queensland coast for what appears to be an extended vacation, whilst a 24 year old Helen Mirren - straight from the Royal Shakespeare Theatre - changed horses completely here to give a remarkably mature interpretation of Cora Ryan, a lonely and unsophisticated orphaned teenager trapped in an isolated and unrewarding life with her drunken and quarrelsome grandmother. When Cora meets Bradley she starts by regarding him as a possibly useful source of pocket money, quickly comes to respect him for what he is, and finally develops a real affection for him. Michael Powell, returning to directing after the failure of Peeping Tom, was as usual both deft and effective, although more easy going and less powerful than for example in Black Narcissus. The colour cinematography was mostly a delight - the three strip Technicolor process used avoided the garish colours so often encountered in travel documentaries and many major feature films. I felt that the principal weakness of this film lay in Peter Yeldham's film-script, but it may well have originated in Lindsay's novel. He was one of Australia's best known artists and during his long career as both artist and writer, one may assume that he must have experienced periods when he felt like the artist of his story; this film certainly conveys the feeling of becoming burnt out and drained of creative energy just as he may himself have experienced it. I have not read the book and my quarrel with the film-script may or may not also extend to it, but I felt that by featuring a long series of very unlikely events, it unfortunately made the film appear to be some sort of dream story or myth rather than a real life drama. In fairness both Lindsay and the scriptwriter may have been aware of this problem and have accepted it as inconsequential. Their object was to convey the reality of loss of artistic vision for any artist, and the final film-script did this very effectively. I found that, when I stopped analysing the mechanical details of the events shown, and concentrated on the emotions with which they were associated, my recognition of the exceptional quality of this film rose sharply.SPOILER AHEAD: The film's title is misleading for anyone who, like myself, is not familiar with the story - in it Bradley, a 60 year old worldly wise artist, makes no attempt to seduce his new under age model. Clearly if such a thought has ever entered his head he has rejected it instantly. But as Cora continued to model for him over many weeks they develop a very real friendship. The climax of the film is the confrontation which leads to the accidental death of Cora's grandmother (and the highly improbable sequence in which a local policeman decides that this does not even warrant a formal open inquest), Only after this, and right at the end of the film, does Cora show that she is very disturbed by the complete absence of any personal attention being paid to her by her new friend, something she feels must indicate some significant failing or inadequacy on her part. The film closes with Cora, reassured on this point, starting what appears likely to become a successful attempt to seduce him.