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This year was the first in a decade and a half where I didn’t manage to attend any screenings at the London Film Festival. By the time I got through the queue for online bookings everything I had wanted to see had sold out. 

Here I am two months later though and all the movies I had wanted to catch at that event, I have now watched. I didn’t get to see any of the cast or directors present their work of course, which is one of the things I really love about the festival, but with this last one I am nonetheless up to speed with my intended viewing. (*At the end I’ll indulgently share a list of all the Hollywood stars I have seen at the LFF over the years, you know so that you don’t have to feel too bad for me.)

I’d been keen to see Jay Kelly because it looked to celebrate filmmaking and also seemed quite meta in having George Clooney play a movie star with a phonetically matching name who like Clooney is often accused of just playing himself. 

This is not really what Jay Kelly is though. Certainly there are a few other references to its lead actor’s own career near the start, with comments about his cosmetically greyed hair and liking for espresso coffee, but it quickly moves away from doing this. Ultimately he is only playing himself in as much as Julia Roberts does in Notting Hill.   The narrative doesn’t chronicle the ins and outs of his job either, rather it follows him as he looks back on the cost of the profession. It also centres on Kelly’s relationship with his manager, played by Adam Sandler, very much reflecting the Billy Mack and Joe section of Love Actually.

I think all of this makes it better than what I’d anticipated. Jay Kelly is a story told through the lens of the life of a famous actor but ultimately it is a tale of friendship and family and how other things in your life can get in the way of this. Clooney and Sandler are both as good as they’ve ever been and they are supported by a group of familiar faces in relatively small roles, one of whom Emily Mortimer cowrites with director Noah Baumbach. There is something in the way Kelly and Sandler’s Ron are with one another that is conflicted yet warm that feels different to what we’ve seen in Baumbach’s other films but not unlike that between Lily James and Emily Beecham in Mortimer’s TV adaptation of Nancy Mitford’s The Pursuit of Love. 

There is nothing here that carries any great power; Jay Kelly is a relatively gentle watch, but it is kind of beautiful. The movie wasn’t in competition at the London Film Festival but I wouldn’t be surprised to see it come up in awards season. You don’t need to worry about failing to get yourself a ticket anymore though as it has just hit Netflix.

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*That list:

Amy Adams

Lenny Abrahamson

Caitríona Balfe

Cate Blanchett

Kenneth Branagh

Jessie Buckley

Olivia Colman

Alfonso Cuarón

Guillermo del Toro

Jamie Dornan

Claire Foy

Selena Gomez

Mia Goth

Luca Guadagnino

Maggie Gyllenhaal

Tom Hiddleston

Dakota Johnson

Angela Jolie

Brie Larson

Jennifer Lawrence

Rooney Mara

Alan Menken

Takashi Miike

Sarah Polley

Alan Rickman

Zoe Saldana

Kristen Stewart

Tilda Swinton

Mia Wasikowska

Ben Wheatley

Ben Whishaw

Kate Winslet

…

but not George Clooney