(First published at Desicritics)
It isn't easy to make an intelligent, sensitive, uplifting and witty film on teenage pregnancy-especially in America, where the issue is a political hot button. With Juno, however, writer Diablo Cody and director Jason Reitman manage to do just that.
So well written and humanely depicted are the characters that you're forced to suspend judgment on the issue; indeed, the movie makes the word "issue" sound heavy-handed, and sixteen year old Juno MacGuff's (Ellen Page, please give her an Oscar now) pregnancy seems like an innocent, youthful indiscretion. Juno is portrayed as an endearing, middle-American, precocious teenager in complete control of her life. This humanizes her and deftly overturns the stereotype that "pregnant sixteen year old" conjures (sister Spears, for instance). Sure, she has all the characteristics of her age - sarcasm, the hearts for the adorably awkward Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera, understated and outstanding), and a passion for rock- but she is gracefully intelligent.
The film's feel is neither saccharine nor preachy, and the musical score adds the right flavors. In lesser hands, humor might've made the goings on wacky, even distasteful- after all, there
really is nothing funny about a pregnant sixteen year old. But Cody and Reitman put humor to its best use: as an antidote Juno and her father (J.K. Simmons, brilliant and cute), like most of us, use to cope with their lives. When Juno tells her dad she's pregnant, his disappointment is real but not over-the-top. "I thought you were a girl who knew when to say 'when'", is all he tells Juno - there is no verbose condemnation, no antics, but a heartfelt remark that is all the more effective in its laconism. "I was hoping she'd been expelled for drug use" he quips to Juno's stepmom in the same wry, deadpan tone that his daughter seems to have inherited.
Juno decides to give her child to a rich, suburban couple- Marc (Jason Bateman, doing justice to an important and difficult character) and Vanessa Loring(Jennifer Garner, transitioning beautifully from a Stepford wife to a nurturing mother). The dialogue at their first meeting is top-notch funny and wonderfully pits the folksy MacGuffs against the yuppie Lorings. The fleeting attraction between Marc and Juno is handled with restrained sensitivity; it proves to be a coming-of-age experience for Juno but not, alas, for Marc, which gives us an interesting and tender twist at the end.
Here is an adult film about adolescent mistakes that asks us to understand rather than judge. Deservedly, the queue for tickets to the show after mine ran around the block; after all, not often does a topical movie make you chuckle, choke and chew on its subject.
It isn't easy to make an intelligent, sensitive, uplifting and witty film on teenage pregnancy-especially in America, where the issue is a political hot button. With Juno, however, writer Diablo Cody and director Jason Reitman manage to do just that.
So well written and humanely depicted are the characters that you're forced to suspend judgment on the issue; indeed, the movie makes the word "issue" sound heavy-handed, and sixteen year old Juno MacGuff's (Ellen Page, please give her an Oscar now) pregnancy seems like an innocent, youthful indiscretion. Juno is portrayed as an endearing, middle-American, precocious teenager in complete control of her life. This humanizes her and deftly overturns the stereotype that "pregnant sixteen year old" conjures (sister Spears, for instance). Sure, she has all the characteristics of her age - sarcasm, the hearts for the adorably awkward Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera, understated and outstanding), and a passion for rock- but she is gracefully intelligent.
The film's feel is neither saccharine nor preachy, and the musical score adds the right flavors. In lesser hands, humor might've made the goings on wacky, even distasteful- after all, there
really is nothing funny about a pregnant sixteen year old. But Cody and Reitman put humor to its best use: as an antidote Juno and her father (J.K. Simmons, brilliant and cute), like most of us, use to cope with their lives. When Juno tells her dad she's pregnant, his disappointment is real but not over-the-top. "I thought you were a girl who knew when to say 'when'", is all he tells Juno - there is no verbose condemnation, no antics, but a heartfelt remark that is all the more effective in its laconism. "I was hoping she'd been expelled for drug use" he quips to Juno's stepmom in the same wry, deadpan tone that his daughter seems to have inherited.Juno decides to give her child to a rich, suburban couple- Marc (Jason Bateman, doing justice to an important and difficult character) and Vanessa Loring(Jennifer Garner, transitioning beautifully from a Stepford wife to a nurturing mother). The dialogue at their first meeting is top-notch funny and wonderfully pits the folksy MacGuffs against the yuppie Lorings. The fleeting attraction between Marc and Juno is handled with restrained sensitivity; it proves to be a coming-of-age experience for Juno but not, alas, for Marc, which gives us an interesting and tender twist at the end.
Here is an adult film about adolescent mistakes that asks us to understand rather than judge. Deservedly, the queue for tickets to the show after mine ran around the block; after all, not often does a topical movie make you chuckle, choke and chew on its subject.
