Josh It's ironic this review is marked with a spoiler warning because nothing much happens. Near the beginning of the film James Mason's character is naked in bed with a woman (although they are both covered with the bed sheets) while watching a TV interview of himself say - "I don't have any plans, just wander around a bit and take a look". There you go, this moment says everything about this movie. From here onward you are wasting your time watching the movie because things happen for no apparent reason ... unless you are hanging around to see Helen Mirren topless. So anyway, he goes to a secluded island to paint because he does, he uses Helen Mirren as his model, while she is swimming he asks her to go naked because, (paraphrasing) he "doesn't like how the dress affects her form" - she waits - "and I'll pay you $1.50 an hour" - she takes her dress off. If you were hanging around to see Helen Mirren topless then you have seen everything you wanted and you can stop the movie there.As a "coming of age" movie, as a romance movie or as whatever label you try to put on this movie - there is no real story. The movie doesn't really explore anything interesting such as their relationship, her sexuality, his desires, his mindset or anything. A lot of nothings happen then movie ends when he decides to get in the water with her. I give the movie 3 stars because the actors are not awful and the island is pretty.

ShadeGrenade 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!

aberlour36 To get another Powell movie, I had to purchase this film, which is not in the Maltin guide. I've long been a James Mason film, and have admired Helen Mirrin's many appearances in more recent years on PBS and in such excellent films as "When the Whales Came." I was stunned to see before me a certified turkey.The whole point of the movie, it appears, was to show 23-year-old Mirrin in the buff. It takes an hour to get to that point, and when it arrives it's quite embarrassing. Ms. Mirrin was one of that rare species of starlets who looked better in clothes than without them. And so she prances about and swims and....but what is a film like this doing in 1969? A decade earlier it might have seemed oh-so-exciting, but not smack in the middle of a deluge of post-censorship porn and near porn flicks.The Australian scenery is nice and well photographed. Mason knows how to act. And that's it! The script is particularly awful. And wait until you see the villain grandma. Perhaps this will become a cult classic. It's certainly bad enough.

chrisart7 Helen Mirren's fine acting as the feral yet alluring Cora, poor country girl-turned-artist's model, and the natural beauty of the Great Barrier Reef (above and below water) are the chief assets in this rather hamfisted comedy/romance/art film directed by Michael Powell in 1969 (his last feature length film) and co-produced by and starring James Mason as a world famous (and world weary) artist looking to recharge his batteries. Mason's effete manner is believable enough, but his dodgy 'Oz' accent is not. The film's weakest aspect is its strained attempt at (sex) comedy. There is little to propel the film forward to its largely unsatisfying conclusion. All of the plot points seem to be forced. Frank Thring, a decade after his magnificent portrayal of Pilate in "Ben Hur", is wasted in a cameo role as an art dealer.Michael Powell's short featurette from 1978, "Return to the Edge of the World", was, in contrast, much more satisfying, and hearkened back to his earlier days when he directed "The Edge of the World" in 1937, a much more artistically (and morally) satisfying film, made prior to his teaming with Emeric Pressburger for a string of successful motion pictures in the 1940s."Age of Consent" is really only for Powell completists, or those who want to see a young Helen Mirren au naturel.