clanciai James Mason was 60 and Michael Powell 64 as they made this film together on a small island in the Great Barrier Reef outside Australia, a comedy about a painter seeking seclusion and finding the opposite, as three other ladies appear to be living on the island, one with a small dog, which James Mason's dog Godfrey gets the better of. Godfrey is the best character of this delightful comedy displaying on a small scale but still the full range of Michael Powell's genius. Just the introductory scene immediately presents a flash of genius, setting the tropical mood, ending up on a Rolex watch, which takes you brusquely out of the underwater tropics, - but stay on, there will be enough of them later still.With the three ladies of very different ages he finds the island crawling with people to his great frustration and dismay, but fortunately one of them is Helen Mirren, which saves his day. But to this crowd of women of very different kinds also his worst friend from the shore appears and disturbs the rhythm, but he is also part of the comedy. Just wait for the funeral.In all, it's delightful to see how Michael Powell after all managed to recover after his downfall with "Peeping Tom" bringing on his undeserved banishment from British cinema practically for the rest of his life, while Australia at least to some degree seems to have saved him.

MartinHafer This film marks the first starring role for Helen Mirren and she appears in quite a few tasteful nude scenes. Because of this, it's certainly not a film for the prudish!James Mason plays Bradley, an aging artist who feels that his work has stagnated. So, on a whim, he decides to relocate from Sydney to the wilds of Queensland in Northeast Australia. There, he lives in a hut and has a simple but lovely life along the beach. There he meets a gorgeous young lady, Cora (Mirren) and she stimulates his creative drive...and he begins making art that he is once again proud of and wants to make more. The problem is that she is very young and he is an older man...and her disgusting grandmother thinks that there's some hanky panky going on...which there isn't...at least for now!This is a slow but enjoyable film. What I appreciated is that while this is by no means a comedy, little comedic touches were used here and there. I also appreciate how different the film is. Although Mason ALSO starred in "Lolita", the tone and style of the two films are like night and day...and I prefer "Age of Consent".

L. Denis Brown 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.

kenjha A famous painter retreats to a somewhat remote island in Australia's Great Barrier Reef to inspire his creativity and finds a young woman to pose for him. Mason is fine as the painter. In one of her earliest roles, Mirren looks amazingly young and alluring as the object of Mason's desire. MacGowran provides the comedy as Mason's unwanted guest on the island. There isn't much of a plot in this laid-back and light-hearted comedy, but it features a quirky cast of characters and is quite enjoyable. The dog is cute and receives on-screen billing. The island setting is beautifully filmed under Powell's masterful direction.