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Summary Famous movie actor Jay Kelly (George Clooney) and his devoted manager Ron (Adam Sandler) embark on a whirlwind and unexpectedly profound journey through Europe. Along the way, both men are forced to confront the choices they’ve made, the relationships with their loved ones, and the legacies they’ll leave behind.
Directed By: Noah Baumbach
Written By: Noah Baumbach, Emily Mortimer
Jay Kelly
67
4.4
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Summary Famous movie actor Jay Kelly (George Clooney) and his devoted manager Ron (Adam Sandler) embark on a whirlwind and unexpectedly profound journey through Europe. Along the way, both men are forced to confront the choices they’ve made, the relationships with their loved ones, and the legacies they’ll leave behind.
Directed By: Noah Baumbach
Written By: Noah Baumbach, Emily Mortimer
Where to Watch
Not available in your country?
ExpressVPN
Get 3 Extra months free
$6.67/mth
Top Cast
Metascore
Generally Favorable Based on 49 Critic Reviews
67
61% Positive
30 Reviews
30 Reviews
37% Mixed
18 Reviews
18 Reviews
2% Negative
1 Review
1 Review
Metascore
Generally Favorable Based on 49 Critic Reviews
67
61% Positive
30 Reviews
30 Reviews
37% Mixed
18 Reviews
18 Reviews
2% Negative
1 Review
1 Review
Dec 5, 2025
This film has the conversational dexterity and comedy of early Woody Allen films, the sadness of Lost in Translation, and the appealingly self-referential celebrity heft of Notting Hill. It is Baumbach, Sandler and Clooney at the top of their games, in a game where the audience is very much invited to play.
Nov 18, 2025
Could the movie have hit harder at the self-involved stars we often worship? Of course. But what makes it powerful is not the Hollywood drama. This is a movie for any of us who have missed a child’s school recital, asked an assistant to work late or skipped a family dinner because a client was running behind. It’s about time. It’s about where we choose to spend our time.
User Score
Mixed or Average Based on 18 User Ratings
4.4
33% Positive
6 Ratings
6 Ratings
22% Mixed
4 Ratings
4 Ratings
44% Negative
8 Ratings
8 Ratings
User Score
Mixed or Average Based on 18 User Ratings
4.4
33% Positive
6 Ratings
6 Ratings
22% Mixed
4 Ratings
4 Ratings
44% Negative
8 Ratings
8 Ratings
Nov 14, 2025
"Jay Kelly" is a smart, funny, and surprisingly emotional ride that deftly interrogates what it means to be a human and an artist in equal measure – and the unfair family sacrifices required to be great and have success. Noah Baumbach gives a complex character study with themes of time, regret, and ego, exploring how these forces shape not only oneself but the lives of those around us. Beloved movie star Jay Kelly is being honored with a lifetime achievement award in Italy. To help mark the occasion, his longtime agent Ron begins the challenging task of assembling Jay’s entourage for the trip. However, the journey becomes more complicated as Jay makes unexpected changes to the itinerary, inviting family and friends who seem anything but thrilled to be part of the celebration. As the travel party gradually dwindles, Jay is forced into reflection on the sacrifices, regrets, and career choices that brought him to this milestone. Clooney delivers a layered performance, oscillating between superficial charm and heavy introspection, that subtly blurs the line between character and actor. A standout montage that interweaves footage from Clooney’s actual filmography lends the performance an almost autobiographical weight, adding depth to a character already steeped in fame, nostalgia, and self-delusion. Equally compelling is Adam Sandler, who continues to impress with his increasingly nuanced dramatic work. As Ron Sukenick, Jay’s weary and overextended agent, Sandler dials back his trademark comedic persona in favor of quiet nuanced pathos. Caught between the demands of his high-maintenance client, his personal obligations, and his own faltering aspirations, Ron becomes the emotional conduit through which we witness the collateral damage of orbiting a narcissistic star. Sandler plays it with restraint and empathy, delivering one of the film’s most resonant performances. This seemingly benign moment in Jay Kelly of two stars sharing space at the end of a long journey does not have its swelling effect without two more moments after it and a dozen more before it. That’s the level of emotional accumulation and sophisticated emphasis assembled by Baumbach in the director’s chair, fleshing out actress Emily Mortimer’s first feature script. The two cultivate a depth of detail where every line and encounter adds merit towards affirming the bigger themes at hand. Before the big star and his humble manager tie these concluding bow ties, Jay Kelly creates a man facing personal and career crises that are colliding unexpectedly. After wrapping his latest picture, Jay learns that his longtime friend and mentor director, Peter Schneider (Academy Award winner Jim Broadbent), has died. Attending the funeral, Jay runs into his old acting classmate, Timothy (Billy Crudup), and they agree to catch up over drinks. What begins as two former buddies swapping stories and comparing craft turns into a heated confrontation. We learn Jay got the big break Timothy didn’t, and that perceived slight still lingers. The encounter with Timothy swerves and threatens to become a possible PR debacle, which activates Jay’s people, including Ron and his publicist, Liz (the excellent and frazzled Laura Dern). More piercingly, though, the verbal salt rubbed into egotistical wounds by Crudup’s dynamite single scene is a colossal trigger for Jay beginning to consider the costs of his ****. create layered practical sets emulating leaps in time and locale that allow Clooney’s older Jay to “walk into” his old memories as a voyeuristic observer. While these ingenious scene transitions play very showy and coy, they ramp up the underlying duel between pride and regret inside Jay Kelly. He adamantly chose to chase **** and likely would again. Still, beneath his gilded reputation and material riches are two failed marriages, a woulda-coulda-shoulda onset co-star romance (Flora and Son star Ewe Hewson), and two daughters, Jessica and Daisy (Mad Max: Fury Road’s Riley Keough and Grace Edwards of Asteroid City), who are recipients—make that, victims—of his absentee parenting. Running away from the Timothy situation, Jay gets it in his mind to surprise Daisy on her post-graduation vacation in Paris in a last-gasp effort to spend quality time together on his way to a career tribute being awarded to him in Tuscany. Ron, Liz, and the rest of Jay’s entourage are caught up in this whim and leave their families (including Baumbach’s wife and fellow filmmaker Greta Gerwig playing Ron’s understanding wife Lois) behind to chase their work responsibilities and their employer’s tailspin. "Jay Kelly" is an inspiring look at self-examination and introspection, exceeded by the performances of Clooney and Sandler. It is evenly melancholy and humorous, which is a departure for Baumbach. So maybe that's the reason why some have been lukewarm but the truth is that if you're person whose had to make sacrifices you definitely relate and moved by.
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Nov 30, 2025
A couple plot threads seem to exist just to give the stacked cast enough to do, but mostly Jay Kelly is an admirably delicate mediation on acting and **** and who pays the costs thereof.
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Nov 18, 2025
“Jay Kelly” is a playful movie made with palpable love for cinema and its magic.
Nov 11, 2025
It’s a testament to the smartness of this casting that Jay Kelly works as well as it does, even if the echos of Hollywood mythmaking are unavoidable.
Nov 12, 2025
Sandler isn’t doing a strained meta riff on his persona; he’s playing an honest-to-God character, plagued by stress, uncertainty, and an unfashionably big heart. There’s art to his performance, and no shortage of life.
Aug 28, 2025
There’s pleasure to be had from Sandler’s nuanced work and from the ensemble’s ridiculously deep bench of gifted supporting players. But the director’s fourth feature for Netflix is mid-tier Baumbach at best.
Aug 28, 2025
Cine-narcissism like this is always tiresome, and it isn’t any more palatable in a European setting.
Nov 24, 2025
Hollow, navel-gazing, self-pitying Oscar bait with unlikeable, uninteresting characters. Yes, traces of Baumbach's talent can be found, however, there's nothing exciting, moving or memorable. Shout out to Billy Crudup and Linus Sandgren though.
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