Eleanor the Great review: Squibb anchors a tender, flawed portrait of aging and memory

Eleanor the Great marks Scarlett Johansson's feature-directing debut, anchored by June Squibb's performance as Eleanor, a 94-year-old who moves from Florida to New York after the death of her best friend and roommate Bessie. Eleanor's daughter Lisa and grandson Max bring her to a small Manhattan apartment, where they hope to place her in assisted living. The premise is a late‑life story about trying to make friends in a new city, but a plot twist arrives that some viewers will find problematic: Eleanor begins to pretend she is a Holocaust survivor in order to connect with others. The device is presented as a brisk, elevator-pitch hook, and it has sparked debate about its necessity and tone.

The film opens with a warm, affectionate look at Eleanor and Bessie in Florida, their daily life and friendship, establishing a tenderness the story will hinge on. The two women support each other through small rituals, from early morning routines to beachside stretches. When Bessie dies, Eleanor is left alone in a city that feels colder and more isolating than Florida ever did. She probes social options at a community center and, after a moment of hesitation, joins a Jewish Community Center group for survivors of the Holocaust. She initially tries to slip away, but other attendees encourage her to stay, and she begins telling Bessie stories as if they were her own. The script, Tory Kamen's first produced screenplay, makes clear that these are the small lies that Eleanor justifies as harmless, even as they threaten the integrity of the memory she and others rely on.

As Nina, an NYU journalism student played by Erin Kellyman, sits in the room, a quiet, moving friendship blossoms between her and Eleanor. Nina, who has recently lost her mother, is moved to tears by Eleanor's stories and wants to talk more, offering a path for the film to explore grief from a younger perspective. The relationship becomes the emotional core of the movie, even as the lie begins to overshadow the truth. The film uses this relationship to examine how memory functions as a form of storytelling and how easily a narrative can be built when the stakes feel intimate and immediate. The tension mounts as the lie grows, and it becomes clear that the far-reaching consequences will test Eleanor's relationships and self-understanding.

Chiwetel Ejiofor appears as Nina's father, a local news anchor who recognizes Eleanor's story as material for a human-interest segment. His presence adds a media lens to the narrative, highlighting how memory travels from private recollection to public consumption. The interplay between personal memory and public narrative sits at the film's thematic center, which also raises questions about the ethics of memory and the responsibilities that come with sharing others' stories. The script's thematic threads regarding memory and memory's preservation arrive a bit late and feel underdeveloped relative to the emotional setup, a common critique of the film's contrivances.

Johansson's direction is restrained and unobtrusive, designed to let the performances carry the drama. The approach feels like a classic New York character drama, focusing on character over spectacle. The result is a film that is strongest when it leans on its two lead performances, with Squibb delivering several quiet, unexpectedly funny, and deeply moving moments, and Kellyman offering a counterpart that lends the story warmth and vulnerability. The supporting cast, including Hecht as Lisa and Price as Max, helps to ground the family dynamics that frame Eleanor's search for companionship. But the plotting devices — particularly the central deception — resist the sincerity of the character work and may leave some viewers unsettled by the film's tonal shifts. Squibb and Kellyman are the film's true throughlines, and their performances are the reason to seek out this title on the big screen.

From a production standpoint, Sony Pictures Classics handles the release, and the film runs 98 minutes. It carries a PG-13 rating for language, thematic elements and suggestive references. The reception so far credits the performances for the film's emotional appeal while noting the script's loose threads. Two and a half stars out of four is the consensus in many reviews. For audiences drawn to character studies of aging, friendship and memory, Eleanor the Great offers a moving, if imperfect, experience that lingers after the credits: a reminder that connection can be fragile yet essential, and that memory itself can be a source of comfort as much as a source of complication.