After nearly fifteen years of stardom in front of the camera, Scarlett Johansson is now making her first foray behind it with Eleanor the Great. Johansson is among the highest-grossing actors of all time, starring as Black Widow across ten films of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and, most recently, as the lead of this summer’s Jurassic World Rebirth. But her directorial debut, which premiered at this year’s Cannes Film Festival, is no such franchise extravaganza.
June Squibb: Instantly Captivating
The official trailer for Eleanor the Great comes peppered with Cannes blurbs, but it also reveals more than enough of the film itself to make such endorsements superfluous.
(Trailer for Eleanor the Great, Courtesy of Sony Pictures Classic)
Eleanor the Great stars June Squibb, an Academy Award nominee for her supporting role in 2013’s Nebraska, as the titular lead, a 94-year-old former Florida resident and Holocaust survivor who feels daunted as she moves up to New York City for the first time in her life. Even in two-and-a-half minutes of spliced clips, Squibb’s performance vibrantly sells this protagonist. Eleanor is a woman who faces her fears and challenges with wry, candid wit and irrepressible spirit. The moment she sadly but drolly declares, “I judged the morgue prematurely, I can see that now,” we’re ready to face them alongside her.
Some Very Worthy Support
Eleanor won’t be alone in her tribulations. At a JCC support group, she meets a journalism student (Erin Kellyman) who needs an interviewee for her article. The prospect of profiling a Holocaust survivor sounds promising, but the resulting article turns out to be merely the setup for what should be a moving relationship. The young woman, we soon learn, lost her mother just eight months ago; it’s something that her father (Chiwetel Ejiofor) won’t even speak about.
Some Refreshing Plot-Related Coyness
This is about all that can be concretely determined from this trailer. It’s apparent that there are other major plot threads and characters: The film also stars Jessica Hecht and Rita Zohar. But the trailer is intriguingly vague about their exact relationships to the protagonist, and about how it will utilize its two main characters’ backstories. How does Eleanor’s horrific past figure into her present emotional hardships? How might her bereaved young friend’s emotional arc connect with her own? In a time when so many moviegoers must pace the theater lobby during previews for fear of seeing an upcoming film’s entire plot spoiled, this is a welcome surprise for such a thoroughly promising movie.
