Was a movie directed by Scarlet Johansson on my 2025 bingo card? Well, no. She’s been in the business for a while, mostly in front of the camera with the occasional producer credit, but now she can add “director” to her resume with the new movie Eleanor the Great. Now, the movie itself wasn’t on my radar, but then I saw Johansson did at least one smart thing: cast the great June Squibb in the lead role. Squibb is probably the go-to actress if you need a recognizable old lady in a movie these days, and her first lead role in last year’s Thelma put her skills to good use. Regardless of how Eleanor the Great turned out, I was at least guaranteed the high probability of a good June Squibb performance.
I’ve gone to the movies for less than that. Besides, I haven’t been in a couple weeks, and I do have a lot of time on my hands right about now.
94 year old Eleanor Morgenstein lives with her friend of 70 years Bessie (Rita Zohar) down in Florida. The two met in Brooklyn at a job and stayed friends through marriage, motherhood, and widowhood. When Bessie dies, sharp-tongued Eleanor decides to go back to New York City to move in with her adult daughter Lisa (Jessica Hecht) and college-age grandson Max (Will Price). Lisa wants to move her elderly mother into an assisted living home since Eleanor has basically never been alone since she met Bessie, and both she and Max have lives of their own that make them too busy to spend time with Eleanor like she is used to.
As it is, Lisa’s attempts to get her mother out end with Eleanor walking into a support group, and when she learns the group is for Holocaust survivors, she tries to get out, but under encouragement from the well-meaning members of the group, Eleanor opts to tell Bessie’s story, a story Bessie never shared with anyone including her late husband, only Eleanor passes it off as her own. That story catches the interest of college journalism student Nina Davis (Erin Kellyman), daughter of Eleanor and Bessie’s favorite local TV reporter Roger Davis (Chiwetel Ejiofor). Nina herself is feeling the recent loss of her own mother, and Eleanor may just have some helpful advice on how to deal with grief. But their budding friendship is built on a lie of rather epic proportions. It’s only a matter of time before Eleanor is found out.
I came to Eleanor the Great looking for a great June Squibb performance, and that is essentially what I got. Squibb’s Eleanor is an outspoken old woman with a lot of opinions, someone who loves a good argument and doesn’t mind defying her well-meaning daughter’s expectations. She really just wants a friend, but she never comes out and says that, and every bit of energy and verve the movie pulls out can be attributed to Squibb. She’s charming and feisty, so it’s easy to see why Nina and other people might want to spend time with her if they let themselves want to.
Unfortunately, she’s also the only real reason to see Eleanor the Great. There’s nothing bad here on display so much as it is rather average. Yes, Eleanor’s lies will be found out, and flashback scenes show Bessie telling Eleanor her Holocaust survival stories with suitably horrifying detail, plus the grief that Nina and Roger are feeling for the loss of Roger’s wife and Nina’s mother are all done well enough, but there isn’t much here that I can say grabbed me all that much aside from Squibb’s performance. It’s a fine enough little movie, not bad for a feature debut, but at the same time, nothing to really write home about either. When Ejiofor’s expressive eyes seem like something I have seen many times before during a big monologue that is meant to tie up the plot a bit, then I think there might be some problems. But hey, Squibb got herself another lead role, and at her age, we should probably treasure these moments for as long as we can.
Grade: C+
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