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Juno
(2007)
Like its title character, Juno truly
captures the essence of teen age. While it contains a lot of posturing and trendy slang, and appears to take serious issues too lightly, it contains a wisdom and maturity beyond its light-hearted facade. I expected a heavy dose of style over substance when I entered Juno, but never anticipated tearing up on several occasions while a wide smile covered my face. This film completely won me over.
While the story isn't anything revolutionary, there's a parallel between the
narrative of the film and the tone of the movie that makes it work incredibly
well as a whole. When sixteen-year-old Juno MacGuff (Ellen Page) discovers she's
pregnant after a spur-of-the-moment hook-up with an awkward classmate (Michael
Cera), she decides to carry the baby and then give it up for adoption to an infertile
upper-class couple (Jennifer Garner and Jason Bateman). Unsurprisingly, Juno
is faced with questions of life, love and her own identity that act as a macrocosm
of the coming-of-age experience of teens everywhere (pregnant or otherwise).
At first I was put off by the film's snappy, colloquial dialogue, feeling that it was trying much too hard to sound genuine yet quirky. I can't really say that it ever grew on me, but I began to understand that it serves a deeper purpose in the movie than to coin the next catch-phrase and garner a few laughs from the audience. We've all been that insecure teenager, who defines their identity by their quirky uniqueness and use of catchy idioms. It's a surface behavior that covers up the vulnerabilities and uncertainties beneath and the same rings true in Juno.
Quite often the film feels forced and doesn't quite work, but there are also
moments which are wise, tender, and true, and it's these moments when the soft
underbelly of the movie exposes itself and everything seems to fall into place.
Juno tells her father (J.K. Simmons) at one point that she "doesn't know
what kind of girl she is" and the film as a whole feels like it's going
through the same identity crisis. Normally I'd say this would be a flaw of the
movie, but it works so well here that it actually strengthens the parallel between
Juno's experience and the movie as a whole.
Ellen Page is the undisputed star of the film, and does an outstanding job. After
she broke onto the scene in Hard Candy, I felt she had a lot of potential,
and she's cashed that in here. I have high expectations for her in the future.
The rest of the cast is equally solid, including Allison Janney as Juno's stepmother
(but isn't she always great?) and Olivia Thirlby as Juno's best friend Leah. There's
a real connection between all the characters, and one reason so much of the otherwise
disjointed and wayward film works is that the characters are so real and so believable
that everything else falls into place around them.
There are times that one could suffer from quirky overload
while watching Juno, but again, it just works so well
in the context of the film. From the art direction (who uses
a hamburger phone? I mean really?) to the song score by The
Moldy Peaches' Kimya Dawson to the performances, this film
screams "indie," yet it has a true beauty and genuineness that
literally brought tears to my eyes on several occasions. When
Juno tells the father of her child that she loves him because
he is so cool without even having to try, his response is "I
try really hard, actually." The same statement could be made
about Juno, and with the same results. There's
no doubt that everyone involved is trying really hard to make
a stylized, awkward comedy along the lines of Little Miss
Sunshine, but it's a successful effort, and I for one
fell in love with the film, not for being "cool" per se, but
for being very, very good.
-Mark
Moreland
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All contents ©
2004-2009 Thoughtsonfilm.com |
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Director:
Jason
Reitman
Writer: Diablo
Cody
Starring: Ellen
Page, Michael Cera, Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman, Allison Janney,
J.K. Simmons, Olivia Thirlby
Distributor: Fox
Searchlight Pictures
Runtime: 92
min
Rating: PG-13
Release Date: December
5, 2007
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