Mouse Review: One Of 2026's Most Moving Movies

Simultaneously a 2000s-set coming-of-age tale and an exploration of grief, Mouse is a lovely, nuanced, and deeply emotional viewing experience. Published Nov 5, 2026, 10:41 AM EST Alex is the Senior Editor of Reviews & Prestige Content, overseeing ScreenRant's film reviews as one of its Rotten Tomatoes-approved critics. After graduating from Brown University with a B.A. in English, he spent a locked-down year in Scotland completing a Master's in Film Studies from the University of Edinburgh, which he hears is a nice, lively city. He now lives in and works from Milan, Italy, conveniently a short train ride from the Venice Film Festival, which he first covered for SR in 2024. Even films that tackle the heaviest of subject matter can be a breath of fresh air. Mouse, the third feature collaboration between Alex Thompson and Kelly O'Sullivan and their second as co-directors, is both a coming-of-age story and an examination of grief – not as parallel tracks, but colliding, even complementary forces. It explores what happens when, in the wake of suddenly losing one of your life's defining people, you start to grow into the empty space they've left behind. The feelings that conjures are big and heavy, and though I would call this one of the most emotional cinematic experiences I've had this year, the movie (as the title would suggest) is small and light on its feet. There is humor, compassion, and plenty of hope to pair with the sadness and anger; the filmmakers sit with these feelings without wallowing in them. The result is some wonderfully cathartic viewing that never feels like too much. The credit for this is shared in all directions. The well-observed script is a foundation for a textured recreation of early-2000s suburbia, and the actors are afforded the room to breathe life into their already strong characters, yielding especially touching work from Sophie Okonedo as the story's grieving mother. By surrounding its emotional core with all this specificity, Mouse becomes one of the year's great films. Mouse Uses The Coming-Of-Age Structure To Tell A Very Nuanced Story The movie begins with a loving friendship that is, in some notable ways, imbalanced. To the rest of her school, Minnie (Katherine Mallen Kupferer) has little identity of her own outside of being Callie's (Chloe Coleman) best friend. Callie is one of the stars of their performing arts high school, and she eagerly accepts the spotlight; she dreams openly of becoming a Broadway star, and imagines it happening in especially dramatic fashion. They love and value each other, but as we spend their last day of junior year with them, we understand that both of them are too content to let Minnie define herself by the comparison. (According to her mother, Minnie's destined to find herself in college, and she seems resigned to the wait.) By the next evening, Callie has died. It's unclear what caused her to crash her car into a telephone pole, but an unworn seatbelt turned what could've been a minor accident into a fatal one. Though we understand that the film will be grappling with the deep, thorny sadness of this loss, both for Minnie and Callie's mother Helen (Sophie Okonedo), Mouse has also set up a clear challenge for its young protagonist. Waiting another year isn't an option anymore: Minnie will have to discover who she is without Callie now. And, however conflicted it may make her feel, it's possible that she may like what she finds. In many ways, O'Sullivan and Thompson tell a very classic coming-of-age story. Its strong sense of place, ability to tap into truths about the teenage experience, and awareness of class will spark fair comparisons to Lady Bird – though, with all due respect to Greta Gerwig's youth, Mouse is about a much less annoying person. Minnie is not someone who sees herself as the main character in her own life, but she gradually discovers the opportunities to become one. She has (or creates) tension with her mother (Tara Mallen), whom she's embarrassed by. She connects with Kat (Iman Vellani), a video store clerk who's had her own brush with loss, and has her first real romantic experience. She's bullied by Cara (Audrey Grace Marshall), who's somewhat co-opting Callie after her death, and learns to stand up to her. The way the movie approaches (and then embraces) these feelings, and the way it captures each character's journey to doing so themselves, is both moving and beautiful. The one major divergence from the coming-of-age playbook, and the element that threatens to send the film into much more chaotic territory, is Minnie's relationship with Helen. Okonedo's stay-at-home mom is very abruptly left without purpose; she and her husband, it turns out, were only staying together for Callie anyway. But as she moves through her impossible grief, Minnie starts spending more time with her, for very complicated reasons. As the two people who were closest to Callie, they understand each other in a special way, and Helen is eager to hold onto that connection. But Minnie has also been jealous of her friend's more affluent home life, and her more refined mom, who always prepared home-cooked meals. She's unwilling to let anyone see her own home, not even to drop her off there. Her desire to spend more time with Helen, at Callie's house, may not be as motivated by staving off her best friend's absence as it seems. Whether Minnie admits this to herself or not, she's inserting herself into this home like there's suddenly a vacancy she can slot right into. Mouse isn't interested in analyzing that in this way, however, or turning it into something explosive. Instead, it looks on with a gentle acceptance. The film's real position is that grief that big has its own gravity, and if it doesn't halt the momentum of life entirely, being in its orbit will alter one's trajectory. The only thing to do, really, is work toward accepting that it's okay to move forward – that moving forward will happen anyway. The way the movie approaches (and then embraces) these feelings, and the way it captures each character's journey to doing so themselves, is both moving and beautiful. Thompson and O'Sullivan's previous feature, Ghostlight, was one I heard good things about in 2024 but ultimately passed me by. Mouse has me wanting to rectify that. Even if you're someone who's wary of such heavy themes, if this film is playing in a theater near you, I would highly recommend seeking it out. Mouse releases in limited theaters November 6 before expanding nationwide November 13. Release Date November 6, 2026 Runtime 120 minutes Director Kelly O'Sullivan, Alex Thompson Writers Kelly O'Sullivan Producers Bonnie Comley, Pierce Cravens, Steven A. Jones, Ian Keiser, Chelsea Krant, Stewart F. Lane, Abigail Rose Solomon, Alex Thompson, Alex Wilson Cast Sophie Okonedo Helen Bell Katherine Mallen Kupferer Minnie Dunn