Juno

Posted on April 15, 2008 at 8:00 am

B+

Lowest Recommended Age:	Mature High Schooler
MPAA Rating:	Rated PG-13 for mature thematic material, sexual content and language.
Profanity:	Strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	None
Violence/ Scariness:	Sad and tense confrontations
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	December 5, 2007
Date Released to DVD:	April 15, 2008
Amazon.com ASIN:	B000YABYLA

Juno%20poster.jpg
It’s time for the q-word again. Every year, it seems, there is some audience-favorite-quirky-little-indy — that category is now a genre of its own, like thriller and romantic comedy. 2006’s Little Miss Sunshine was called “this year’s Napoleon Dynamite. And in 2007, ever since it premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival, “Juno” has been called this year’s Little Miss Sunshine. All three films are modest little independent films, though the two most recent have, if not A-list superstars, certainly established A-list actors. All three are small stories about people who are not glossy, air-brushed, homogenized, safe, and stories that are not formulaic or easily classified. The movies are filled with telling details and some intriguing messiness in character and plot. Hollywood’s word for this is “quirky.” When it’s done right, it is endearing, engaging, and unforgettable, filled with people we want in our lives.

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Smart People

Posted on April 10, 2008 at 5:00 pm

B-

Lowest Recommended Age:	High School
MPAA Rating:	Rated R for language, brief teen drug and alcohol use, and for some sexuality.
Profanity:	Very strong language
Alcohol/ Drugs:	Drinking and drug use by adults and teen
Violence/ Scariness:	Peril, accident with injury, reference to sad off-screen death
Diversity Issues:	None
Date Released to Theaters:	April 11, 2008

A burned-out literature professor named Lawrence Wetherhold (Dennis Quaid) has written an “unpublishable” book called The Price of Postmodernism: Epistemology, Hermeneutics and the Literary Canon. Of course it is unpublishable. Everyone knows that the part of the title that comes before the colon in literary works is supposed to be self-consciously cutesy. A book like that should be called something like A Bad Slammin’ Groove: Epistemology, etc. I suppose it is a symptom of Lawrence’s ennui and disconnection that he has lost the essential ability for preserving that academic necessity: a snarky combination of smug superiority over popular culture and even smugger superiority over the ability to speak in its patois.

Lawrence, his college-student son James (Ashton Holmes from “A History of Violence”) and his college-applying high school senior daughter Vanessa (“Juno’s” Ellen Page) are each floating around in separate bell jars, suspended in space, all the air sucked out by anger and loss, all three unable to communicate and unaware of how much pain they are in. Lawrence’s brother Chuck (“my adopted brother,” he reminds everyone — played by Thomas Hayden Church) moves in. Yes, he will prove to be the life force confronting the dessicated souls so out of touch with their true feelings. But Church and the screenwriter, novelist Mark Poirier, give him more perspective and more spine than these characters usually display. “These children haven’t been properly parented in many years,” he tells one visitor. “They’re practically feral. That’s why I was brought in.” And he believes it.

Poirier appreciated literature and he knows how to create characters who talk (and don’t talk) about what is going on like educated people. He has not quite worked out the difference between a novel and a movie, however; he still tells too much and shows too little. An exceptional cast takes the material as far as it can go, but it still feels synthetic and its sense of tone is uncertain, biting here (faculty committee, unpublishable tome), sentimental there (how many times do we have to see a grieving spouse who can’t clean out the closet?). Quaid is especially strong and Parker lets us see her sweetness and longing, but Page’s and Church’s characters are underwritten and it feels like it all gets tied up too hastily. The characters might be too smart for their own good, but the movie could use a few more IQ points.

Interview: Diablo Cody and Ellen Page of “Juno”

Posted on December 12, 2007 at 8:00 am

The author and star of this year’s most popular and critically acclaimed independent film talked with me about “Juno,” a smart, funny, touching film about a pregnant teenager who decides to give her baby to a childless couple. This is the first screeplay for Diablo Cody (born Brook Busey), whose book and blog about her life as a stripper first brought her to the attention of Hollywood. Ellen Page’s astonishing performance in “Hard Candy” as a young girl who turns the tables on a predatory pedophile showed her to be an actress of formidable range and talent. There could not be a better match of performer and material and it was clear that they have become close friends.
NM: I am a big fan of your director, Jason Reitman, who wrote and directed Thank You for Smoking.
EP: Working with him in the kind of atmosphere he creates is just lovely, awesome. He is extremely assured, he knows what he wants, but he is also unbelievably collaborative. And he has an enormous heart, only good intentions, there’s only goodness with Jason.
DC: I agree on all counts. It’s very rare actually. It’s very rare that you meet somebody who has that incredibly sharp mind and is also incredibly compassionate. You don’t see those qualities paired in a lot of people, and Jason has that elusive combo. He is a great filmmaker and has a keen comic timing, which is something that is evident in his first movie as well. Juno is a movie where he really wears his heart on his sleeve as a director. As a writer it was amazing to work with him because he is such a generous collaborator.
NM: It’s impossible to imagine anyone else in the role. Ellen, you seem perfectly cast as the stunningly self-possessed but very vulnerable heroine. I was especially moved by the scene where she finally lets go and sobs.
EP: Ever since first reading “Juno” and Juno kind of entering my life, I immediately fell head over heels in love with Diablo, the script, with Juno, I became obsessed. With regards to that scene, Juno definitely hides a lot in what she projects as herself in her kind of sarcastic wit and what have you, but the reality of the situation is that it is a bit of an extreme situation, even though Juno in the film deals with it in such a refreshing way. There’s the kind of relationship she hasn’t had with her mother, literally abandoned by her mother, as she develops this connection with the baby that is growing inside her along with Vanessa’s love for that, when it all starts falling apart, it’s absolutely devastating for her. In that moment, when she’s alone, she allows herself to experience that devastation at that point.
DC: Ellen is such a strong actor I’ve seen that people sense a connection between her and every character she plays. I like to believe in my heart that she has a special connection to Juno, but that’s just talent, baby.
EP: I think the reason that Diablo’s script is so awesome and people are connecting to it is so many elements of it are completely unexpected and that is so refreshing. People, especially these days, are afraid to take risks. Mind you, every year, it is the people who do take those risks who are successful, the people who have had those really long careers are the ones who have dared to have a sense of integrity and individuality. And I think that’s something Diablo really did with this script. So you have Jennifer Garner giving an incredible performance, just outstanding. And Allison Janney and JK Simmons, it’s full-on pandemonium extravaganza of awesome individuals.

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