An elderly woman named Eleanor loses a lifelong friend and then accidentally stumbles into claiming her friend’s real-world Holocaust story as her own. This tale carries some foul language and sexual discussions in its mix. But the story is emotional, funny and sweet as it ruminates on loss, grief and loneliness.
The simple fact is that Eleanor and Bessie were meant to be great friends.
The two women met and laughed together as young girls. They saw each other through marriages, the raising of families and the death of loved ones. And in their latter years, they were still dear enough chums that they could live in a small apartment together. There was never an angry word. Each day was jovial and pleasant, each moment fitting comfortably into the next like slipping into a pair of a well-worn shoes.
When Bessie died, though, it was a horrible loss for Eleanor. Their apartment, as small as it was, suddenly felt huge and empty. So, Eleanor decided to head back to New York City and move in with her daughter (Lisa) and grandson (Max).
Even at the age of 94, however, spitfire Eleanor is not one to sit back and knit quietly in a corner. She has always been fast with a wisecrack and eager for activity. And she isn’t about to stop now. So she aims her quick-quipping gunsights at her daughter. That’s when Lisa, while ducking barbs, insists that mom should find some new friends her own age. So Lisa sends her mom over to the local Jewish center.
Eleanor isn’t Jewish, but she had married a Jew. So she knows her way around a synagogue and a social center. Soon, she accidentally stumbles into a meetup for Jewish Holocaust survivors. And before she can slip back out, she’s warmly welcomed and asked to share her Holocaust story—which she doesn’t actually have, of course.
She does, though, have something she can share: Bessie’s story. You see, Bessie had shared her own painful story of the Holocaust over late night cups of tea, sometimes after waking from bad dreams. So Eleanor recounts those stirring, emotional memories with a tear in her eye. But … she tells her beloved friend’s story as if it were her own.
Those heartfelt words help Eleanor connect with the kind people in the survivors group. Yes, it was all something of a, well, fib. But Bessie’s memories are dear to Eleanor, and they make her think about reconnecting with her faith. They also open the door to connecting with a visiting college student named Nina, who’s currently grieving the loss of her mother.
Nina tearfully begs Eleanor to let her use her story in a college paper she’s writing.
Eleanor has no intention of doing so. But this poor girl is so wounded and so moved by Bessie’s story. Perhaps the deception could go on just a little bit longer, if just to help this hurting young woman.
The problem is, deceptions have a way of running wild. Even well-meant ones.
And it’s hard to admit … to a lie.
This is a story of friendship, family, loss, grief and loneliness. Those may not all sound like “positive” things, but the movie’s handling of those subjects makes all the difference. The film suggests that only through openness and love can people heal from grief and anguish. (And though the film doesn’t lean heavily into faith, we certainly see people relying on their Jewish convictions and some proclaiming their importance. More on that theme below.)
Eleanor makes mistakes, and her choices hurt others; but she earnestly asks for forgiveness for her lies and foolish actions when they eventually come to light. We also see her being a caring and sincere friend in many instances, both to Bessie and Nina. And while Eleanor and Lisa travel some bumpy relational roads, Lisa makes her love clear for her mom. Max voices his love for his grandmother, too.
Someone declares that “grief can make you blind to the suffering of others.” He goes on to seek forgiveness for his own emotional blindness and selfishness.
Eleanor eventually realizes that her deceptive choices (especially borrowing Bessie’s life story) are similar to Jacob’s story from Genesis. But her misguided takeaway is that “deception isn’t always bad, if the intention is pure.”
Nina’s mother was Jewish as well. And in a way, Eleanor’s growing friendship with the young woman not only helps Nina along the process of healing from her grief, it also helps her draw closer to faith, too. Nina goes to synagogue with Eleanor.
At one point Nina refuses to talk about the painfulness and loneliness she feels after her mother’s death. But Eleanor speaks of Jews fleeing Poland and never talking about the anguish they went through (which is part of Bessie’s story). And she declares, “You’ve gotta talk about the things that make you sad” if you want to heal.
That statement becomes a central theme of the movie.
We see several instances—including moments with Eleanor and with Nina’s father, Roger—when people come to grips with their overpowering grief after losing loved ones, as well as admitting their need to verbalize that pain. Which is, of course, exactly what the Jewish Holocaust survivors were meeting to do.
In relation to that, Roger asks: “Why do we as a society bury grief in the darkness when it is the inevitable outcome of the love that unites us?” He then admits that he isolated himself selfishly after his wife’s death, and in turn left his daughter alone with her pain. Dad and daughter embrace and Roger tells her how much he loves her.
Elsewhere, we see several flashback scenes during which Eleanor listens to and comforts her friend Bessie as she remembers the past. Ultimately, Bessie says that she often asked herself, “why am I alive?” And she wondered, “How could God exist?” But then she reaches out to Eleanor and says, “Maybe God saved me, so I can share my life with you!” The two friends embrace tearfully.
[Spoiler Warning] Eleanor’s deceased husband was a Jew, and it’s implied that through him she had an at least casual connection to the Jewish faith. But after watching a young girl’s bat mitsvah ceremony, she decides to work toward having a bat mitsvah herself and dedicating herself to the faith. She speaks with a Rabbi who discusses a Torah passage with her: The story of Jacob imitating his brother Esau to trick Isaac into giving him his blessing in Genesis 27.
While sitting at Lisa’s kitchen table, Eleanor jokes with Max about his mom’s nickname when she was in school: “Class mattress.” In a conversation, Eleanor and Nina brush across the subject of sex. Eleanor states that she misses it. Nina casually declares that she is gay.
Bessie recounts a story that involves a brother who always looked out for her when they were taken by the Nazis as children. She describes their hiding and their violent capture. In an attempt to escape, they both leap off a moving train. Bessie survived, but upon backtracking to find her brother, she states that she found him murdered on the ground, riddled with bullets. We see the elderly Bessie jolting up from sleep with reoccurring nightmares of those and other days during WWII.
There are four s-words, along with a couple of uses each of “d–n” and “h—.” God’s name is misused eight times (once with “d–n”).
Someone uses an offensive hand gesture.
We see a number of prescription bottles on Eleanor’s end table. An older woman sings about a variety of things in life, including “pretzels and beer.” Eleanor drinks wine with her meal, as do Roger and Nina. Lisa drinks a beer.
Eleanor lies to a nurse to get her ailing friend some medical help. Roger complains that his daughter “always sees the best in people.” And he warns that people often take advantage of that positive character trait.
When a well-known actor or actress steps away from their place in front of the camera to take the chair behind it, they need to be cautious. After all, no matter what kind of movie they choose to direct, their debut will raise and answer a number of questions about their ability to steer an entire cinematic ship.
First-time director Scarlett Johansson has made her choices pretty well.
Eleanor the Great isn’t too big or too heavy. It’s a deftly handled little film that does a nice job of balancing its presentation, its cast and its message.
Nonagenarian June Squibb is sharp and fiercely funny. She inhabits Eleanor so well that even when the character’s deceptive choices begin unravelling, she never feels like the bad guy. The story actually uses Eleanor’s blunders to help us see another side of the movie’s finely tuned meditations on loss, grief and loneliness.
This pic has a few content stumbles in the form of some foul language and short discussions of violence and sexual things. But those elements are kept light.
Beyond that, though, Ms. Johansson’s first captaining venture is a pleasing and emotional one. And it could give viewers a nice narrative voyage to enjoy together, as well as sparking conversation about its significant themes afterward.
After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.
