June Squibb Is an Action Star in Hilarious Revenge Comedy Thelma
Every good action hero knows you’ve got to stick to your guns. Ethan Hunt is a marathon-running master of disguise. John Wick has never lost count of his remaining bullets. Jackie Chan’s various inspectors and agents view the world as their personal set of monkey bars. When writer/director Josh Margolin’s debut Thelma keeps its sights trained on its rogue granny on a mission (June Squibb), its hilarious geriatric reframe of action-movie tropes has a game champion. Like its absentminded hero, the film can sometimes get sidetracked right when things are getting good, wandering down schmaltzy or twee narrative paths. But when it lets Thelma (and Squibb) do her thing, the comedy is perfectly cute and a stellar showcase for what an actor’s late career can offer.
In fact, much of Thelma is about adjusting our ideas around aging. There’s novelty in the comedic turns from the 94-year-old Squibb and her 81-year-old co-star, Richard Roundtree (in his final film role). These actors get to tap a well that’s unique to their age and the genre without sticking them into the boxes that generally contain old performers. They’re not utterly dignified, wisdom-dispensing elders. They’re not tragic victims of time. And they’re certainly, blessedly not the dreaded “rapping grannies” who are more punchline than performer. As the pair abscond on their quest to retrieve Thelma’s stolen savings, solicited from her cookie jar and mattress by phone scammers, they’re clearly complex, pulling off warm humor, endless charm and impressive stunts. A 94-year-old doesn’t have to ride a motorcycle off a cliff to make you gasp.
Like child actors using their rubber bodies and too-cute grins to their advantage, advanced age becomes a tool Squibb and Roundtree are encouraged to incorporate. Their slow shuffles and quiet frustrations ground you in their over-the-top adventure. Before Thelma, I’m not sure I ever would’ve considered “getting up from a fall” as the basis for a setpiece bringing two characters together. It’s a testament to the cast and the seriousness with which Margolin takes his subject that this scene isn’t just heartwarming, but exciting.
Many of the little genre gags Margolin includes in his script are silly-sweet, spy movie nonsense for the gray-hairs: Hearing aids replacing earpieces, a high speed scooter chase, computer hacking that’s actually just closing a pop-up. The best laughs, though, come from Squibb’s deadpan deliveries of relatable elderly eccentricities. Nothing feels cheap or mean-spirited here. Her performance balances physical comedy and perfect timing; she’ll deliver Margolin’s solid jokes, but it’s all the better that she can do so while realistically looking like my grandmother struggling to type a Facebook message. The ironic competence needed to believably, consistently embody the left-field foibles and unexpected turns of an older mind is sneakily impressive, and Squibb—whose Oscar nomination for Nebraska came a full decade ago—thrives in the contradiction.