Venus, a caustically humorous little film, contains the somewhat grating element that it plays like a tribute and career eulogy to its still-living main star Peter O'Toole. I believe if the main character, an aging actor named Maurice, was originally written without O'Toole in mind, he has nonetheless been morphed to become his alter ego.

Of course, this is not an unlikely occurrence in the land of filmmaking, but here it's been set up to show off all of O'Toole's best qualities in what feels like a thinly-disguised bid for awards (O'Toole received an honorary Oscar in 2003 for his body of work and declared that he still had the ability to earn a regular one). But this is admittedly an external distraction; viewed years from now, who will know the difference? What the viewer will get is a story about how the mind doesn't necessarily age along with the body; how the elderly's methods of harnessing and channeling youthful desires contrasts with the careless methods of the youths; and, as a result, how youth can seem wasted on the youthful.

Maurice is a young man in a dying body, wiser yet perhaps not closer to any eternal truths than he might've been decades ago, and still focused on immediate concerns, like making the most of his newfound attraction to his friend's young grandniece (Jodie Whittaker), a rough-edged girl who consequently forms a peculiar symbiotic relationship with the actor.

Within this shamelessly but cautiously lecherous Shakespeare-quoting rascal lies O'Toole himself, proudly not ready to surrender to his own career twilight and the onset of his winter years. He puts on a show good enough to overshadow the surface appearance of using the movie to make just that kind of statement. (Capsule review)

(Released by Miramax and rated "R" for language, some sexual content and brief nudity.)

Review also posted at www.windowtothemovies.com.