The Current Cinema - Barrie Pattison ponders ELLA McCAY (James L Brooks, USA, 2025)

Emma Mackey as Ella McCay

Broadcast News is one of my favourite movies so I homed in on Ella McCay the new film ending a fifteen year retirement by  its creator James L. Brooks.  He’s eighty five years old now. His work is most notable in TV - Mary Tyler Moore, The Simpsons, Rhoda but his movies are substantial - Spanglish, As Good as it Gets and (less so) Terms of Endearment.

 Ella McCay has arrived  as the big Xmas attraction, trailing terrible reviews.  It’s a big (two hour, all-star) theatrical feature. Impeccably scored by Hans Zimmer and shot by Robert Elswit, from the Paul Thomas Anderson films. I often found myself laughing out loud  at it but I can see where the film’s bad press is coming from.

Emma Mackey  (get it) is, unprecedented for a thirty four year old female, the Lt. Governor of a state which might be Rhode Island, where they filmed.  Her boss Albert Brooks accepts a post in the Obama administration and resigns leaving her in charge for the remaining fourteen months of his term, despite the fact that her reformist zeal sends people to sleep in meetings. (“Would you like to hear about my favourite community health program?” “God, no!”)

Jamie Lee Curtis, Emma Mackey, Ella McCay

The film, draws from a formidable talent bank. First up we get a narrator (”You are truly blessed if you gave never experienced other people’s normal, happy families as a small stab in the heart”) who it took me half the picture to recognise as an older Julie Kavner, collaborator of Woody Allen and the voice of Marge Simpson. Add on Jamie Lee Curtis, Brooks from Broadcast News, also director of the great Defending Your Life, and Woody Harrelson, whose appearances lift the movie each time he shows up. I don’t think the people writing about film now were alive when all these great talents peaked.

The film also fields some surprise discoveries. Kumail Nanjiani looks like he’s part of the scenery the first time we see him but, given the chance to move up from his voice acting and walk-ons, he becomes one of the film’s dominant, endearing characters. His scene with the director’s son Joey Brooks, about overtime for their security trooper detail is great and the follow-up when the star bawls them out, while being deeply grateful for their loyalty is a show piece of writing and performance.

There are quite a few of those. The appearance of Becky Ann Baker as Jack Lowden’s nasty mum and Kathleen Choe’s hard bargaining Majority Leader impress as iceberg tips of their back stories.

I like the surprise introduction of the lead’s “not-agoraphobic” brother Spike Fearn’s girlfriend, a year after he stopped taking her calls. She turns out to be black comic Ayo Edebiri. Their uneasy but so suitable relationship is James Brooks in top form.  However the scandal that topples the lead’s career is a convenience no more plausible and the hoked-up impeachment of President Martin Sheen half way through The West Wing.

So what’s really wrong with Ella McCay? Brooks set out to make an up-date of the Frank Capra comedies but he didn’t have Katharine Hepburn and Cary Grant to front the project. Emma Mackey and Jack Lowden give it their best but they come over more like Megan Fox and Mike Myers getting their big break into serious acting, which is a short fall. I was never convinced that I was watching the first thirty two year old female deputy governor and her "ticking time bomb" husband. 

My excuse for not approving what is a polished and ambitious attempt to mix class entertainment and Trump era comment (that only becomes evident in the last and irresistible scene) is that I’d seen better. I don’t know what all those knocking reviewers can offer.