Ella McCay (12A)

The year is 2008 and Governor Bill is excited to accept a position in the newly formed administration of President Barack Obama. He prepares to hand over the reins to his second-in-command, Lieutenant Governor Ella McCay, whose personal life is a mess. As she prepares for leadership and attempts to resolve issues with her father Eddie, and her younger brother Casey, Ella faces stern tests of her resolve at work, supported by her aunt Helen.

LondonNet Film Review

Ella McCay (12A) Film Review from LondonNet

In Terms Of Endearment, the impeccably crafted weepie which earned James L Brooks three Oscars including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Adapted Screenplay, Shirley MacLaine stops Jack Nicholson in his tracks by asking for his reaction to her telling him that she loves him. “I was just inches from a clean getaway,” he quips, flashing a wolfish grin. Brooks prevents several characters from making quick and easy getaways from their feelings in Ella McCay, a lightweight, politically-minded comedy drama starring Emma Mackey in the title role…

The year is 2008 and Governor Bill (Albert Brooks) is excited to be shortlisted for Secretary of the Interior for the incoming administration of US president Barack Obama. Bill’s popularity is largely due to the policies of his deputy, Lieutenant Governor Ella McCay (Mackey), and consequently, he anoints her as his successor. “What’s more beautiful than two people who owe each other everything?” Bill jokes to Ella. The announcement of Ella’s succession couldn’t come at a worse time. She is facing a potentially damaging newspaper article relating to her relationship with power-hungry husband Ryan (Jack Lowden) and her philandering father Eddie (Woody Harrelson) has reappeared and is stirring up deep-rooted anger about how he mistreated Ella’s mother (Rebecca Hall).

Additionally, Ella’s younger brother Casey (Spike Fearn), who hasn’t left his apartment for months but refutes suggestions he might be agoraphobic, neglects to answer the phone and could be emotionally spiralling after an awkward attempt to date Susan (Ayo Edebiri). As the new governor’s world spins off its axis, Ella seeks counsel from her aunt Helen (Jamie Lee Curtis).

Ella McCay is a meandering meditation on the personal cost of public service and poor choices made in the name of love, which woos Brooks back to the director’s chair for the first time in 15 years since the release of the disappointing romantic comedy How Do You Know. His script steps back in time almost as many years to the immediate aftermath of Obama’s election win on a manifesto of hope and change, when voters looked to the White House for remedies to soothe a deepening economic crisis and curb openly hostility between the two tribes of the American political establishment.

Mackey’s 34-year-old lawmaker, the third youngest woman to hold the position of governor, errs towards exasperation at key junctures and Brooks relies on Oscar-winner Curtis to inject vim and humour as the straight shooter who doesn’t mince her words. When Harrelson’s serial womaniser asks what it will take for people to believe he is a changed man, her one-word response strikes a perfect note of withering disdain: castration. The subplot involving Fearn and Edebiri is quirky and endearing but superfluous. I campaign for brevity in Ella’s adversity.

– Sarah Lee