Eleanor the Great review — Scarlett Johansson's poised directorial debut
The last of three directorial debuts by big-name actors at Cannes this year, Scarlett Johansson's Eleanor the Great is — unlike Kristen Stewart's more pretentious The Chronology of Water and Harris Dickinson's riskier Urchin — exactly the kind of conventional, performer-led film one would expect from an actor. It also has the jackpot combination of being tear-inducing and laugh-out-loud funny.
Johansson has a 95-year-old secret weapon in the magnificent June Squibb — Oscar-nominated for Nebraska — who plays Eleanor Morgenstein, a widow who has been living in domestic bliss with her best friend Bessie (Rita Zohar, also lovely) for 11 years in Florida. When Bessie dies Eleanor moves back to New York with her daughter Lisa (Jessica Hecht) and grandson Max (Will Price). She wastes
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The Guardian
34 minutes ago
- The Guardian
‘Allegory for the times we live in': De Niro and Scorsese reunite for Casino at 30
For this year's Tribeca film festival, the annual New York salute to moviemaking featured a special screening of Casino, the Martin Scorsese-directed drama starring Robert De Niro, Joe Pesci and Sharon Stone, timed to its 30th anniversary. But even though the splashy epic premiered in this same city back in November 1995, its themes of power, money, greed and ego are echoing in the modern ethos louder than ever. 'You can go back to the ancient Greek tragedies,' said Scorsese, speaking alongside De Niro and moderated by standup comedian W Kamau Bell on stage at the Beacon Theater before the screening. 'It's a basic story of hubris and pride, with the pride taking us all down.' '[Joe Pesci's character] sort of takes nobody's input,' said Bell to De Niro. 'It's his ideas or the highway, and that ultimately leads to his destruction. It's almost an allegory for the times we live in. I don't know if you guys ever thought about that?' 'Yeah, a little bit,' De Niro snickered back to guffaws from the crowd. 'Do you have a couple hours?' The release of Casino in the mid-90s, which focuses on the tragic exploits of the mafia that controlled Las Vegas and the excess that came with it, arrived at a time when that culture was on a downswing, with the decade seeing crusaders such as Rudy Giuliani bringing down organized crime one-by-one. Zooming out, it also arrived smack in the middle of the Clinton administration, all making the characters in Casino seem like fringe figures. But judging by the constant drumbeat of headlines from the current American political climate, 2025 depicts a starkly different world, and with that a Casino for fresh eyes. Even the style and culture of Vegas is entirely different. Or is it? 'Now you can bring the family!' said Scorsese of its cleaner reputation present-day, as opposed to the era when it was Sin City; a town where anything goes. Still, Bell couldn't help but ask: 'Is Vegas better when it's run by the mafia, or is it better now when it's run by the corporations?' 'Is there a difference?' Scorsese smirked as the crowd roared. 'That's all I'm saying.' 'These days especially,' De Niro chimed in. Adapted from the book by Nicholas Pileggi and based on the true events of Chicago transplant Frank 'Lefty' Rosenthal, Casino was born during unique times in Scorsese's filmography. The director had just helmed the lush and quiet Age of Innocence, a subtle love story based on the Edith Wharton novel about 1870s New York. When Casino was released, audiences couldn't help but relate it to the film-maker's other story of mafia and hubris: Goodfellas, which came out five years beforehand and also starred De Niro and Pesci. ' It was compared, I would say, unfairly and lazily to Goodfellas, but in the 30 years since, I think it's grown up quite well,' said Bell. As the years have ticked by, the gap between the two films comparisons have widened, yet again allowing the viewer to watch Casino not thinking of it as a sort-of follow-up, but a standalone film. 'The idea was to take the last 15 minutes before [Ray Liotta's character] Henry Hill gets arrested in Goodfellas and make that one film,' Scorsese said of the memorably manic sequence during which we see Hill stretched thin with nerves frayed, edited together with a series of quick cuts and a pulsating soundtrack. 'In other words, take it even further and just go to the point where we can sustain that style, which really came from (the rhythm) of storytelling on a street corner. Some of the best actors we ever knew were the kids telling the stories on the street.' As a result, the director and actor spoke about weeks of night shoots, loud casinos and the movie's intense violence (they had to tone down a scene when a man's eyes bulge out after his head is put in a vice). Scorsese also recalled trying to finagle having Rosenthal visit the set while the mobster was listed in the state's Black Book; a persona non grata in Nevada. The director went as far as working with former MPAA president Jack Valenti to use his vast connections at the time to lift the ban. 'Jack called me and he said: 'Martin, I've never had so many doors closing my face so fast in my life,'' impersonating Valenti's Texas drawl. 'This man is a member of the ma-fia.' De Niro was reliably quieter while Scorsese discussed the film, a hallmark of their relationship. When asked about his memorable wardrobe in the film; his flashy suits a trademark of the character, De Niro said an archive of his costumes are stored at the University of Texas at Austin. 'I was collecting all of this stuff for years and it started getting expensive,' said De Niro, who realized that after he filmed Scorsese's musical New York, New York, all of his wardrobe was being pilfered and he realized he should preserve them 'When I was getting fitted for my shoes for Godfather II, I think they were the shoes Warren Beatty wore in Bonnie and Clyde.' When asked about advice to the young film-makers in the audience, De Niro offered rallying words. ' I just say follow through on what you want to do. It might not be easy, but the only person you have is yourself to keep going. You just gotta keep doing it and believing in yourself. God helps those who help themselves.' Scorsese echoed those sentiments, noting it's never easy when it comes to the craft, even at his high level '[People will say:] 'Oh, you have money and everything working for you' and that's never really the case. Often if you get a bigger budget, it's worse in terms of the production. The more money, the more risk and therefore the pressure is on to take less chances aesthetically and artistically.' 'One thing [the director] Arthur Penn told me when I was a young film-maker was: 'Remember, don't lose your amateur status.' He was right. You struggle feeling like an amateur, but it's amator, in Latin, which means love. That's the thing you gotta hold on to.' However, Scorsese left the audience with this: ' The time is now to take advantage of whatever you can say,' said Scorsese. 'Who knows what's gonna happen. You have to really utilize what supposedly is called free speech.'
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Gleeful leftist late night hosts delight in Trump Musk fallout: 'The big, beautiful betrayal'
Gleeful late-night hosts took victory laps around President Donald Trump and Elon Musk Thursday as they delighted in the pair falling out. Across the board, the MAGA-hating panel of hosts rejoiced in the spat. They repeated Musk's claim that Trump is 'named in the Epstein files', mocked SpaceX 's record of exploding rockets and questioned what Trump would now do with his Tesla. The spat made for easy material for the hosts, who are struggling to maintain ratings with a tired format. Among the most delighted was Jimmy Fallon. 'You can tell Trump is really mad at Elon because earlier today he was seen driving a Prius,' the former SNL star noted. 'Trump said he hasn't felt this betrayed since McDonald's started putting apple slices in Happy Meals. 'It's orange vs. white,' he added. 'It's like watching a creamsicle attack itself.' Over on CBS, Stephen Colbert sang a similar tune, also reveling in the rift between whom he smarmily put as 'the world's most famous besties'. It all happened on social media, serving as easy ammo for the hosts. 'So now Donald Trump is a Tesla owner who hates Elon Musk?' Colbert asked during a more than 12-minute monologue devoted to the subject. 'He's never been more relatable.' He then honed in Musk's claim that Trump is 'in the [Jeffrey] Epstein files' - documents involving the late financier and his alleged accomplices spread out across various probes and lawsuits that have been mostly kept classified. 'Trump's going to have to get one of those bumper stickers for his Tesla that says "I bought this before Elon told everyone I was on Epstein's plane,"' Colbert quipped, as hosts like Jimmy Kimmel and Seth Meyers offered similar, smug material. 'The real truth is that Musk is mad about the things that affect him, like cutting the electric vehicle tax credit, not using his company Starlink for air traffic control, and that they pulled his friend's nomination for head of NASA,' Kimmel laughed on the set of Jimmy Kimmel Live! 'What Elon Musk cares about is Elon Musk,' he further noted on his ABC show, before bringing the First Lady into the mix 'Now, between Elon and Melania, Trump now has two foreigners who won't sleep with him. 'I feel bad for Donald Trump,' he then added. 'I mean, first, he lost Jeffrey Epstein, now, Elon. He's running out of friends. 'You know, I knew this day would come, and yet, somehow, it's even better than I imagined,' he kept on. 'It's like coming down the stairs on Christmas morning and finding a second tree.' On Late Night, Seth Meyers showed similar bias, labeling the feud over 'Trump's Big Beautiful bill' a 'stunning turn of events'. The comic then offered some uncharacteristic stern words. 'Things have been bad for Elon, which is what happens to everyone who sells their soul to Trump.' The Daily Show's Michael Kosta, filling in for Jon Stewart, also commented on the quarrel. He sarcastically opened the show with: 'America, tonight we are a nation at war.' 'I thought these two billionaires with the world's biggest egos would work it out amicably.' the Daily Show senior correspondent said sarcastically. 'Washington is a lot like high school and not just because all the politicians are trying to date high-schoolers.' Fallon further fanned the flames with a reference to the recent Blur Origin broadcast live by rival CBS, which featured a crew of pop stars, TV personalities, and Jeff Bezos's fiancée. 'Trump said that the easiest way for the country to save money would be to terminate all of Elon Musk's government contracts,' Fallon set-up. 'Smart, now the future of space exploration rests on Katy Perry.' Colbert, meanwhile, went as far as to mimic Musk's accent, while further fanning the flames surrounding Musk's claims Trump is linked to a convicted pedophile. 'Donald Trump, was a sexual predator that preyed on young women, which is something I've only decided to tell you because he hurt my feelings,' he said, speaking as if he were the Tesla boss. 'I am the hero of the story!' A White House official on Thursday said Trump and Musk were scheduled to speak in person on Friday. The official did not give a time for the call, which could ease the feuding after an extraordinary day of hostilities. Meanwhile, late night, as a format, is on the decline. Numbers show Greg Gutfeld's late night-styled Fox alternative attracting the largest average nightly audience of the field - something unthinkable just a decade ago. Epstein, moreover, died in prison in 2019 after being convicted. He and Trump were once close friends.
BreakingNews.ie
an hour ago
- BreakingNews.ie
Ex-girlfriend of Sean Combs tells court of Las Vegas ‘hotel night'
A recent ex-girlfriend of singer Sean 'Diddy' Combs returned to the witness stand on Friday in his sex trafficking trial. The woman using the pseudonym 'Jane' previously testified that he pressured her into drug-fuelled sex marathons similar to those described by another former girlfriend, R&B singer Casandra 'Cassie' Ventura. Advertisement Jane is among several witnesses at the trial — now at the end of its fourth week — who accuse Combs of violence, including Cassie. Combs, 55, has pleaded not guilty to running his business empire as a racketeering enterprise that enabled and concealed the abuse of women across two decades. If convicted, he faces 15 years in jail to life imprisonment. On Friday, prosecutors questioned Jane about sexual subjects, beginning with a 2023 trip to Las Vegas where Jane said she and Combs had a 'hotel night' with an 'entertainer'. Assistant US Attorney Maurene Comey asked if Combs ever used the word 'freak'. Advertisement Jane said he would say 'he wants his freak' and that she understood that to mean 'he wanted me to be wild and sexual'. Her description of 'hotel nights' has closely paralleled Cassie's earlier testimony about numerous 'freak-offs' she had with male sex workers under Combs' direction. Jane said during her first day of testimony on Thursday that she repeatedly told Combs, in person and in writing, that she did not want to have sex with other men. But Combs, who paid her rent and controlled other parts of her life, kept pressuring her and she felt 'obligated' to take part in the 'hotel nights', she said. Advertisement
