“Eleanor the Great,” produced by Scarlett Johansson and starring June Squibb as Eleanor Morgenstein, came out in theaters on Sept. 26. Watching the trailer, one might have expected a heartfelt movie about a feisty 94-year-old woman navigating life and loss. This movie delivered, but it was so much more than that.
The movie begins with Eleanor and her best friend Bessie Stern (Rita Zohar), who she had lived with for 11 years, waking up in the morning and making breakfast. They had met in New York City in the 1950s and had been best friends since then, often going to Coney Island, where Eleanor said they “practically lived” on the boardwalk. From the beginning, the viewer can tell that Eleanor has reached the point in her life where she says what is on her mind, regardless of the consequences. She is brutally honest, with a touch of tough love.
Their sassy dynamic was shown in their weekly grocery trip when Bessie was looking for kosher pickles. She asked the teenage employee where the kosher pickles were, and he told her he did not know and that all pickles taste the same. Eleanor snapped at the boy, questioning his intelligence and asking if he knew where the back of the store was, and to go check for the pickles there.
Tragedy struck when Bessie had a heart attack during their grocery trip, ending up in the hospital with Eleanor by her side, saying, “You’ll be okay.” The film then cuts to a scene of Eleanor sitting on a bench by herself, the same bench that she and Bessie would often sit on together often.
Suddenly, Eleanor is 94 and moving to Manhattan for the first time, living in her grandson’s old bedroom in her daughter’s apartment. She has never spent this much time alone. This movie tackles common but unspoken issues like loneliness and grief.
Struggling with self-isolation and grieving her friend, Eleanor begrudgingly attends a singing group, however ends up in the wrong room, accidentally joining a support group for Holocaust survivors. When she tries to leave, they tell her to stay and tell her story. She starts talking, but it is not her story she is telling; it’s Bessie’s.
She falls deeper into her lie when she meets a student journalist studying at New York University who is interested in featuring her. She ends up forming a special bond, with the 19-year-old Nina, becoming the granddaughter that Eleanor never had. Eleanor is the epitome of a stubborn, Jewish grandmother, in the best way possible.
As someone who grew up in a Jewish family with a great–grandfather who had survived the Holocaust, this movie hit hard.
This heartfelt film is a testament to friendship, suffering, and grief. It shows the importance of forgiveness and the crazy things people do when suffering, without even realizing it. With tragedy, hope, and ups and downs, this movie will break the viewer’s heart a million times and put it back together. It is raw and real, and everyone should see this movie, regardless of their background, just make sure to bring tissues.
This movie keeps the audience laughing and crying with its comedic spin. It’s ageless, bridging the divide between young and old. Eleanor ends the movie with a true testament to her friendship with Bessie, “Sometimes when you live with someone for that long, you forget where they end and you begin.”
