The Sundance Movie Pageant’s lineups can usually be darkish affairs with edgy shocks, narcotics and strident political speaking factors.
However one of the crucial soul-satisfying motion pictures to premiere on the 2024 version options no drug sellers, whistleblowers or bloodbaths. It’s a couple of candy 93-year-old grandma who collects marbles and rides a mobility scooter.
And, OK, sure she additionally holds a person at gunpoint.
film overview
THELMA
Working time: 97 minutes. Not but rated.
Known as “Thelma,” the off-the-charts likable action-comedy stars the marvelous, indefatigable June Squibb as a nonagenarian on a harmful mission.
Thelma is a seemingly regular widow who lives the quiet life in California as she’s sorted by her 24-year-old grandson, Danny (Fred Hechinger, a teddy bear going by a disaster). He genuinely loves being along with her and each of them know that their remaining time collectively is brief.
When a telephone scammer pretending to be a lawyer representing Danny methods Thelma into mailing him $10,000 in money, she’s harm — and hungry for revenge.
Uninterested in being considered by her helicopter daughter (Parker Posey) as previous and helpless, she decides to seek out the opportunistic felony and get her a reimbursement. That process seems to be tougher than she thought.
Like James Bond has many occasions earlier than, Thelma goes rogue and runs away from her nervous household who pursue her in a frenzy. Like a undercover agent, she drops her wristwatch monitoring system in a parking zone to get them off her scent.
Author-director Josh Margolin imagines, fairly cleverly, what a “Mission: Inconceivable” movie may seem like for a 94-year-old girl, however he doesn’t scrimp on deeper points both. This isn’t a full-blown, clown-car parody like “Spy” or “Johnny English.” “Thelma” is at its finest when it touchingly addresses the complexities, challenges and liberations of age.
That freedom is alive in Thelma’s fiery “what have I bought to lose?” angle that powers her journey by, alongside her husband’s good friend Ben (Richard Roundtree). For her, the cash comes second to being taken benefit of and regarded as an simply manipulated previous woman.
The 94-year-old Squibb is past fantastic within the position as she revels in revolt whereas additionally imbuing Thelma with relatable vulnerability. And, good God, is she humorous.
![June Squibb and Josh Margolin](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2024/01/l-r-june-squibb-josh-75117521.jpg?w=1024)
A repeated gag by which Thelma retains operating into aged folks she thinks she is aware of, after which will get into lengthy conversations about the place they could have met, solely to find she was considering of any person else is hilarious each time.
“Thelma” is an auspicious function debut from Margolin, who has an actual knack for comedic timing and tempo. The director is Judd Apatow-like in his straightforward mixing of coronary heart and “ha”s, and concocts so many memorable bits. Simply wait till you meet “Starey Larry.” He’s a filmmaker with a number of industrial potential.
The ending, I’ll admit, comes collectively awfully conveniently. “Thelma,” actually, is a cinematic fantasy of the absolute best final result for a theft. The mistaken was dedicated domestically, and never by an unreachable syndicate in China. The villain isn’t a terrifying thug, he’s Malcolm McDowell.
Nevertheless, any plot greasing is shortly forgivable due to how rattling pleasant it’s to be using at the back of Squibb’s scooter. That that is the actress’ first main position in a decades-long profession is the best crime of all.