Laurie’s Reel Thing Chick Flick Review: Juno
With all my recent blogging about the rise in teen pregnancy, reviewing Juno seemed inevitable. You know how sometimes all the good lines are included in a movie’s coming attraction trailer and there’s nothing left to enjoy when you see the real thing? Happily, that’s not the case with Juno. I absolutely loved this quirky little indie-type flick-turned-media-darling a la Little Miss Sunshine. As a writer, I especially appreciated the smart, witty dialogue. The lines come so fast and furious that this would be one of the few movies I’d pay to see a second time; I was so busy laughing at or thinking about a line that I missed the next one and the next one.
Now that Oprah et al have discovered Juno and it’s been nominated for gazillions of awards, I won’t be giving anything away here by telling you the bare bones of the plot (sans the details of its I-didn’t-see-it-coming twist ending.) Expect superb performances by newcomer Ellen Page, a quirky, wise-cracking teen who, faced with an unplanned pregnancy, decides to give her baby up for adoption; seasoned actors Allison Janney and J.K. Simmons, as her equally quirky but supportive parents; and Jennifer Garner and Justine Bateman as the yuppifed prospective adoptive parents. (Also making a blink-and-you-might-miss-him cameo as the local video store guy is Rainn Wilson of “The Office:” a plus for all us Office-addicts suffering from new episode withdrawal.)
Here are some more interesting little factoids about this little-movie-that-could which has already earned a not so little $72+ million dollars at the box office. For starters: This was only young director Jason Reitman’s second feature film (Thank You For Smoking was the first). Plus, scriptwriter Diablo Tony, born Brook Busey-Hunt (her parents, not surprisingly, still call her Brook) was a stripper in Minnesota before she wrote this screenplay, her first ever. Betcha that’s one pair of pleased-as-punch parents who are ecstatic about their offspring’s career change!
My only reservation about Juno? Having blogged a lot recently about “babes having babies,” I do worry that this movie glorifies teen pregnancy. There appear to be few consequences for the protagonist: her parents are 100% supportive and super-cool from the get-go (“Did you see this coming?” one asks the other. “No, I thought it would be something like a DUI,” replies the other, or words similar to that effect), there’s little backlash from her classmates, she keeps the guy, and she chooses a loving home for her baby, in a neat, “all’s well that end’s well” ending.
So, if you’ve seen it, what do you think about Juno?
PS: When I wrote my first post about the recent rise in teen pregnancy, I wondered aloud about the reasons contributing to it. In fact, a poll we posted on iVillage asked just that. About 57% of you chose as the primary reason “An increasingly permissive society,” with the rest about evenly divided between “Just say no (abstinence) sex ed” and “Media glorification of teen pregnancy.” So what do you think? Cast your vote and read the close to 100 fascinating comments posted on this issue.
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After seeing this movie at our local theater, I hurried home to have one of those "discussions" with my teen age daughter. I had read your blog "Babes Having Babes" and thought of my experience. First of all, why do they market this movie as a comedy? A sixteen year old facing pregnancy is not funny, especially to parents who are raising teens in the times of Jamie Lynne and others. The movie is wonderful and very creative, but funny?
I have conflicted feelings about Juno. Now that it's grossed more than any of the other Best Picture contenders, there's a huge rush of Juno backlash. I don't think either the extreme praise nor the backlash is really deserved.
I think the beginning of the film verges on annoying, especially when it comes to the slang-laden dialogue. The "teen speak" isn't in any way natural (like the vulgar dialogue in Superbad) and it isn't over-the-top enough to be stylized (like the amazing, noir-meets-high-school dialogue in Brick). It fell into this middle ground that just fell flat for me.
That quirk mostly drops out halfway through the movie, and then I think the real Oscar-deserving Juno kicks in. I know that the adults' super-nice reactions are a little too easy, but I think the film eventually achieves an emotional maturity when it shows her struggling with her situation. I also think that Jennifer Garner's and Jason Bateman's subplot gets overshadowed by Ellen Page's terrific performance. They deserve more praise. I don't want to spoil anything, but I like how their situation resolves without turning either character into a cartoonish bad guy.
I'm interested in seeing what Diablo Cody does next. I love how her script was female-centric without focusing on women who want to get married and go shoe shopping. I just hope someone tells her to be confident enough in her own writing to drop the quirky gimmicks. She doesn't need them.
While I thought Juno was cute and clever, I completely agree that it could send the wrong message to impressionable teenagers.
Juno is a wonderful film that shows that you can put a child out for adoption and live a normal life, not one that is constantly tormented by guilt. Our society puts out so many messages to teens implying that if they have an abortion they are evil, that they'll miss their adopted child until they almost mad, and that keeping it themselves is selfish and foolhardy. What's a girl to do? See Juno, you'll find yourself realizing that a teen pregnancy doesn't have to ruin a girl's life.