Thelma is based on something that actually happened to director Josh Margolin's grandmother. A scammer called her, pretending to be Josh, and told her he had been arrested. She sent $10,000 to an address he gave her. She was 93. And then, when she found out she had been deceived, she decided to go get her money back.

Margolin turned that story into something genuinely wonderful. Thelma, played by June Squibb in a career-defining performance at 94 years old, is not a film about a helpless old woman. It is a film about an old woman who refuses to be treated as helpless. That distinction is everything.

The premise is framed explicitly as a Mission Impossible parody for the elderly set. Margolin shows Thelma watching the Tom Cruise original on television and deciding that if a man can hang off a cliff, she can retrieve $10,000 from a scammer. This is the film's central joke and its central truth: physical capability is relative, but determination is not. A 93-year-old woman with a scooter and a stolen gun is still a 93-year-old woman with a plan.

Squibb makes the whole thing work. This is not a sentimentalized old-lady performance. Thelma Post is sharp, irritable, proud, occasionally wrong about things, genuinely funny, and authentically scared of physical vulnerability in a way the film takes completely seriously. When she falls in a shady neighborhood and cannot get up on her own, the scene is not played for laughs. It is played for the reality of what it feels like to have your body stop cooperating. The film earns its comedy by respecting its central character enough to show her real limitations alongside her real strengths.

Richard Roundtree plays Ben, Thelma's elderly friend and reluctant co-conspirator, in his final film appearance before his death in October 2023. The performance is a fitting farewell. Roundtree plays Ben as a complete human being — not as a token sidekick and not as a Shaft reference. He is a widower who felt responsible for his wife's fall because his hearing impairment meant he did not hear her in time. His grief and his friendship with Thelma are the most emotionally complex elements in the film. The scenes between Squibb and Roundtree are the best in the movie.

Fred Hechinger as Thelma's grandson Daniel provides the film's generational commentary. Daniel is a kind but directionless young man who has structured much of his identity around looking after Thelma, which means he has not built much of a life for himself. The film is honest about this as a problem. His journey through the film — from panicked family member searching for his missing grandmother to someone who has seen what she is capable of and recalibrated his assumptions about her — is the secondary arc.

The family dynamics are drawn with particular affection. Clark Gregg and Parker Posey as Alan and Gail, Thelma's son-in-law and daughter, are overprotective out of love rather than condescension, even if the effect on Thelma is the same. The film does not make them villains. They are people who love her and are frightened by what could happen to her, and who have forgotten that being frightened for someone is not the same thing as respecting them. Thelma's mission is partly about recovering her money and partly about reclaiming her sense of herself as someone capable of independent action.

Margolin shot the film on a budget of $3 million and made every dollar visible in the sense that counts: he put it into the performances and the emotional specificity of the script, not into production gloss. The film is shot with care and attention to Thelma's physical perspective — low angles, careful attention to how her body moves through space. This is filmmaking in service of character.

For conservative viewers this film is close to a gift. Here is a film that treats an elderly woman with complete dignity, centers family love as a genuine value rather than a burden to be escaped, takes personal responsibility seriously as a moral stance, and makes its protagonist's determination to right a wrong the engine of the entire story. Thelma does not ask for the government to help her. She does not blame systemic anything. She decides to go get her money back and she goes. That is as traditional an action premise as exists.

Trope	Category	Location	Authenticity
Elder Dignity and Agency	TRADITIONAL	Entire film — Thelma Post is presented as a full human being at 93 with desires, anger, pride, capability, and genuine courage; her age is not treated as a limitation on her personhood	Authentic. This is the film's central artistic and moral commitment. Margolin based the story on his real grandmother and treats her as the most capable person in her own story. This is exceptional in mainstream cinema.
Personal Responsibility Over Victimhood	TRADITIONAL	Central premise — Thelma is scammed but instead of waiting for the police or accepting the loss, she decides personally to retrieve her money	Authentic. Thelma's response to victimization is not to demand institutional help but to take direct personal action. This is the film's moral engine and it runs on a deeply traditional premise: when wronged, act.
Grandmother-Grandson Bond	TRADITIONAL	Throughout — Daniel and Thelma's relationship is the film's emotional center; their love is specific, funny, complicated, and entirely genuine	Authentic. Margolin based this on his real relationship with his grandmother. Many of their dialogue exchanges were drawn from actual conversations. The specificity shows.
Friendship Tested and Redeemed	TRADITIONAL	Thelma and Ben arc — old friends who had grown apart reconnect, argue honestly, and recommit to each other; Ben's return after leaving her is the film's most moving moment	Authentic. The Thelma-Ben relationship is the film's emotional B-story and in some ways its richest content. Two elderly people choosing each other after loss is not given much space in mainstream cinema. This film gives it full weight.
Defense of Personal Honor	TRADITIONAL	Central premise — Thelma goes after the scammer not just for the money but because being deceived is an insult to her dignity; she is defending her sense of self	Authentic. The film is clear that the $10,000 is not really the point. Thelma cannot be the woman who got fooled and did nothing about it. Her honor requires action. This is a traditional motivation.
Family Love Without Ideology	TRADITIONAL	Throughout — the Markowitz family's love for Thelma is genuine, complicated, and presented without any political subtext; they love her; they argue; they reconcile	Authentic. Clark Gregg and Parker Posey as the daughter and son-in-law are not villains. They are loving people who have gotten the balance wrong. The film does not punish them for loving too much.
Grandson as Work in Progress	WOKE	Daniel subplot — the grandson is coded as a directionless millennial whose sense of purpose has been defined by caring for his grandmother rather than building his own life	Mild and complex. The film treats Daniel's aimlessness as a problem rather than a virtue, which mitigates any progressive reading. He is not celebrated for his dependence; he is shown growing past it. Trace-level concern.