‘Nonnas' Review: Vince Vaughn, Susan Sarandon and Lorraine Bracco Bring the Right Seasoning to Netflix's Comfort-Food Comedy

Yahoo

23-05-2025

Like the old-school cooks in his new movie, Stephen Chbosky understands the importance of good ingredients. To tell the story of a middle-aged man's impulsive leap into restaurant ownership, he's gathered an accomplished cast wielding effortless charm. Nonnas is home-style all the way, forgoing jaw-dropping plating for something more reliable and predictable. It will strike a nostalgic chord or two for many viewers, and at any rate offers a welcome change of pace from Netflix's true-crime and action offerings.
Vince Vaughn brings an unforced sincerity to the role of inexperienced entrepreneur Joey Scaravella, and the four nonnas (grandmothers) who join him in his unconventional culinary enterprise are played by Lorraine Bracco, Susan Sarandon, Talia Shire and Brenda Vacarro — heavy hitters moving nimbly. Though the movie unabashedly celebrates women in their 70s and 80s, it hasn't the strained sensibility of those 'ain't these old gals something?' comedies that have become a subgenre unto themselves. Essentially an up-with-people optimist, director Chbosky (The Perks of Being a Wallflower, Wonder, Dear Evan Hansen) keeps the laughs in a silly but grounded vein, and the emotional moments unfold with the same understated believability.
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Working from a screenplay by Liz Maccie that tells a movie version of the origin story of Enoteca Maria, the helmer and his cast — with spot-on design contributions from Diane Lederman and Brenda Abbandandolo — stir up a convincing portrait of middle-class Italian-American New York (played by New Jersey, with a shuttered restaurant, Spirito's, providing the central location).
Nostalgia courses through Nonnas, along with a strong sense of community through food; the feature's mantra is 'One does not grow old at the table.' This core idea is vividly evoked, with a fluent kid's-eye-view energy, by DP Florian Ballhaus in the flashback sequence that opens the movie: School-age Joey (Theodore Helm) navigates a big, boisterous family gathering — a typical Sunday in his Brooklyn home — while his mother (Kate Eastman) and grandmother (Karen Giordano), bathed in the golden glow of love, preside in the kitchen.
Alone in his childhood home after his mother's death 40 years later, Joey (Vaughn) finds comfort in re-creating the family dishes as best he can from memory. A longing awakened, he makes a trip to the Staten Island farmers' market where his mother and nonna used to buy produce. (Given that Joey doesn't have a car, this is the first of the film's several opportunities for picturesque views of the ferry crossing.) Besides running into Olivia (Linda Cardellini), his high school classmate and the one who got away, he happens upon a run-down restaurant for sale and uses his inheritance as a down payment.
This wasn't exactly what his best friend, Bruno (Joe Manganiello), and his wife, Stella (Drea de Matteo), meant when, concerned that Joey would become stuck in grief, they urged him to do something new. But Joey, a mechanic working for the MTA in a job that clearly means little to him beyond a paycheck, is propelled by a vision and won't be stopped: He'll open an Italian restaurant where grandmothers, not trained chefs, do the cooking. The first of many challenges he doesn't foresee is the unwelcoming small-town insularity of some Staten Islanders, encapsulated in the surly suspicions of a market vendor (Michael Rispoli).
The four nonnas he enlists (they're all of a grandmotherly age, but two of them have no children) include two friends of the family, Roberta (Bracco, rocking a perma-scowl as a world-class kvetch) and hairdresser and dessert-maker extraordinaire Gia (Sarandon, exuding hard-won equanimity). The two newcomers are Olivia's elegant neighbor Antonella (Vaccaro), still devoted to her long-deceased husband, and former nun Teresa (Shire), who has the air of a bird just let out of a cage, and also a calming wisdom when the food fights take on a regional fervor and Sicily (Roberta) squares off against Bologna (Antonella).
Yes, they're types with a capital T, but they're played by actors with personality to spare and no need to go big. By the time the quartet sit down to share limoncello-fueled confessions, they can do so with few words and little fuss. With complementary concision, Vaughn conveys something shellshocked about Joey and, no less, the fighting spirit of someone starting over in a big way, with a new hunger for life — not to mention the elusive recipe for his nonna's Sunday 'gravy,' aka tomato sauce.
The supporting performances all click, especially those by Manganiello and de Matteo, delivering a terrific rendition of marital affection through sparring, as well as worry about their friend. Cardellini is the essence of warmth and smarts, and Campbell Scott offers a commanding cameo as a snooty but not heartless food critic.
As to the food porn — it isn't. Ballhaus captures the dishes with a straightforwardness that matches the lived-in beauty of the movie as a whole, and there's no indulgent lingering by editor Anne McCabe. (The food itself is not going to pass the vegan test, the capuzzelle especially.)
The screenplay by Maccie, who grew up in an Italian-American family in New Jersey (she and Chbosky are married), has a directness that's mostly refreshing, and occasionally too much. The story's intended surprises are telegraphed, and though Joey's setbacks all ring true — bills adding up, trouble with his jerk of a boss (Richie Moriarty), building inspection troubles, a falling-out with Bruno — the resolutions are sometimes undercooked.
No subtext goes unexplained, and at times the score underlines what we already know. But the actors always find the grace notes, and there are sparks in the way everyday exchanges turn sharp with compassion. There are welcome laughs too, particularly in Bracco's grump-meister line readings. Nonnas serves up something that doesn't make you work; rather, it invites you to sit down and enjoy.
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