Thelma Gives 94-Year-Old June Squibb the Role of a Lifetime

This critique was originally released on January 22, 2024 out of the Sundance Film Festival. We are recirculating it now timed to Thelma’s theatrical debut.

“Hey everyone, I’m gonna haul ass to Lollapalooza!” Even now, 28 decades later on, these strains uttered by Grampa Abe Simpson as he revs up a motorbike nevertheless represent 1 of my beloved jokes on The Simpsons. It’s these a best skewering of the aged-individual-does-matter genre of humor that was so commonplace back then and is even now quite popular now. But then some thing like author-director Josh Margolin’s Thelma will come along, about a 94-yr-previous female who goes on a quest to track down the crooks who ripped off her out of $10,000, and manages to be so charming and heartfelt that the laughs by no means sense lazy, low-priced, or cruel. Its observations about the disconnect among its elderly protagonist and the modern society all-around her are incredibly relatable.

When we initially meet Thelma Post (June Squibb), she’s battling with her pc, as her beloved layabout grandson Daniel (Fred Hechinger) tries to support her. (“How do I … I require the … Where is the … What’s an ‘inbox’?”) Thelma has been living on your own ever due to the fact her beloved husband, Ted, handed absent, and Daniel, it appears, is the only household member who has any time for her he’s also a minor frustrated in the wake of a negative break up. So when Thelma receives an nervous telephone contact from a voice proclaiming to be her grandson, saying that he’s in jail following hitting a pregnant lady with a auto and wants $10,000 in cash sent by mail to his defense lawyer, she purchases it. In advance of she sends the income, Thelma calls her daughter, Gail (Parker Posey), Daniel’s mother. Finding no reply, she then calls Alan (Clark Gregg), his father. Neither parent responds in time, so off Thelma goes to the write-up office with the income. The planet does not have time for her, but she has time for the environment — which is her weakness.

The 94-yr-aged Squibb, a great actor who’s never seriously gotten a direct part like this, turns what is or else a very uncomplicated and lovable established-up into something significantly far more profound. That Thelma received cheated is even more proof to Gail and Alan that it may be time for her to transfer into an aged-age facility. Hence, Thelma’s quest to discover the people today that did this to her will become about extra than righting a mistaken or having her income back it results in being a way of proving to anyone (and herself) she still has agency in her lifestyle. That does not halt Margolin from riffing on spy motion pictures and action flicks. One particular of Thelma’s inspirations is the spectacle of Tom Cruise sprinting across the rooftops of London in Mission: Not possible — Fallout. For her, he gets to be a symbol of persistence and resilience in one’s advancing a long time.

Aiding Thelma on her quest is Ben (Richard Roundtree), a buddy who even now grieves the reduction of his spouse, and who putters all-around on a fancy scooter that our heroine “borrows.” Casting the person who was Shaft as Ben will make good use of his charisma, but it also offers Roundtree, in his final function, a wonderful chance to display his array. The melancholy Ben’s need to assist Thelma will come from a have to have for function and companionship: He desires to truly feel handy, and he kind of likes her. But he also has his possess demons he’s trying to triumph over. When his spouse died right after a undesirable drop, he could not hear her, and he blames himself for her loss.

Thelma generates clever, inoffensive pleasurable from assorted aged challenges. Ben and Thelma use their digital hearing aids like earpieces in a caper flick: He can help her navigate a cluttered antique store strewn with lamps and Hummel figurines as if it were being an elaborate laser-beam protection program. A breathless and hilarious motion scene (or, perfectly, “action” scene) entails just one person in a rushing car or truck guiding yet another on how to near a pop-up advert as if it have been a bomb that requires to be defused.

All during, Margolin tends to make absolutely sure that these are not gags poking enjoyment at outdated individuals for staying out of contact: Frequently, Daniel and Thelma come across them selves confronted with similar difficulties. At 1 issue, she asks him what a laptop is, pretending to be a clueless outdated person. Then, she smiles. “I know what a laptop or computer is,” she explains, “but what is it seriously? How does it functionality?” Daniel has no notion. The level is that Thelma could possibly be bewildered, but deep down, so are we all. As the earth spins ever forward, we all wind up out of touch with it before long sufficient.