“Eleanor the Great” is that surprising rare bird that marks the successful features debut of a director, Scarlett Johansson, and writer, Tory Kamen. This charming film, with unexpected depth and humor, tells a story that, in lesser hands, would teeter on the edge of poor taste and mawkish sentimentality, but instead boldly exploits a sensitive topic to great effect. Certainly the marvelous actors pushed this scenario to a satisfying finish line but it was the adept writing and directing that found the right tone for this interesting story.
Eleanor, a bit past 90, has always been an independent soul, eager to push past boundaries and prone to the more than occasional prevarication. Her life in the recent past has been spent living in Florida with her lifetime best friend Bessie. They met in the Bronx ages ago but have been roommates since the deaths of their respective husbands. They have shared everything. Both Jewish, it is Bessie, a Holocaust survivor, who has spent the last 50 or 60 years sharing her trauma, her experiences in labor camps and the loss of loved ones. Eleanor’s life was easy by comparison. Still, their close bond had a deep and empathetic impact on Eleanor’s existence. Together they navigated the ups and downs, the joys and sorrows, but especially the symbiotic relationship that came from their many shared experiences. Bessie is ill and with her death, Eleanor’s life will start to unwind.
Moving back to New York to live with her daughter Lisa and grandson Max, she is suspicious of their motives. Eleanor is not making the adjustment easy on any of them. The obvious solution for Lisa is to find a nice assisted living situation for her mother. The obvious solution for Eleanor is definitely not that. She’s alone, without the anchor of Bessie, and not making life easier for anyone, including herself. Lisa doesn’t have the time to devote to Eleanor but knows that her mother would benefit from the company of people her age. The upper westside JCC (Jewish Community Center) has some marvelous programs for seniors and Lisa finds one that fits the bill, a Broadway appreciation group. Leading a horse to water who may not want to drink, a reluctant Eleanor shows up at the JCC right on time. But instead of turning left, she turns right and finds herself, instead, in a Holocaust survivors group where she is immediately embraced as one of their own. Listening to the stories of the others, she is asked to share. Eleanor, without thinking or a moment’s hesitation, a life-long trait that has never served her well, begins to weave a tale of her life in Poland. Unable to stop the boulder from rolling down the mountain, crushing the truth in its wake, she expands her story. But it’s not her story to tell; it is Bessie’s story, one that was shared in great detail over the years.
Whether the after effects of her grief and loss, grief for Bessie and loss of independence, or because she finds the attention she gets helps her justify her lies, Eleanor has fashioned a path that has nowhere to go but down. Deepening the hole that she has dug for herself, the group has an observer, Nina, a journalism student looking for a story. Captivated by Eleanor and her tale, Nina decides to make her the subject for her next article. Eleanor, having been fully embraced by the survivor group, no longer feeling invisible as she continues to embrace and expand on the lies she has been telling, oblivious to their potential harm. She grabs onto Nina like a lifebuoy. Even more exciting, Nina’s father Roger is a famous local television reporter much admired by Eleanor. Seizing the opportunity and the limelight, Eleanor expands her story into the slights she felt within Judaism as a woman.
For Nina, Eleanor is a different kind of lifeline. Her mother had died several months before and she has been having a very hard time communicating with her father about loss and survival. She was very close to her mother and is not coping well. Eleanor listens and understands loss. But with every passing day, there is a new lie, white or otherwise, and Eleanor comes that much closer to discovery. Unrepentant, however, she enjoys her limited fame and the support she receives from Nina.
It’s not a spoiler to reveal that Eleanor does get caught and her lies have consequences for herself and others. How she and those around her deal with those consequences is an interesting part of the story. As always, Eleanor’s narcissism, because that is what it is, prevents her from seeing the harm that she may have caused. It is only the losses brought on by her lack of insight and prevarications that have the power to upset her. Her actions alone provide the key to her personality; it’s not just loss but the need to be the center of attention that guides her.
Johansson chose outstanding actors to round out her cast of characters. Foremost among them is the feisty June Squibb who plays Eleanor’s grief at the loss of her best friend as the root of her inventive lies, rationalizing them as respect for the life of Bessie whose stories deserved to be told without acknowledging that they were never hers to tell. Squibb is a master at portraying abrasive, almost unrepentant characters, imbuing them with depth and sympathy thinly disguised as chutzpah and defiance.
Her harried daughter, played by Jessica Hecht, never loses sight of her love for her difficult mother despite her inability to offer more than passing support. Erin Kellyman, Nina, is a breath of fresh air who transfers her own needs onto Eleanor when she can’t seem to find what she craves from her father. The discovery of her new friend’s deception becomes paramount to the reconciliation with her father. Chiwetel Ejiofor, Roger, Nina’s famous father, is an actor I will always follow. Here he brings his own interpretation of grief, letting the viewer understand how he is unable to bond with his daughter because of his own loss. That Roger ends up being the key to forgiveness, both for his daughter and Eleanor, is enhanced by Ejiofor’s performance.
This small movie packs a lot of punch and interesting life lessons. The central premise lies in its offensiveness, in how we forgive, and what we forgive. It’s definitely worth a view.
Now playing at AMC theaters and the Laemmle Monica Film Center.
