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Moriarty Adopts JUNO!
SPOILER ALERT !!
Hey, everyone. “Moriarty” here.
Wow. Talk about pressure.
Diablo Cody has somehow picked up the PR nickname “the new Quentin Tarantino,” and I've routinely seen it tossed out in criticisms of her. Particularly in dismissals of her.
Let’s set hype aside for a moment. Let’s set aside the celebrity appearances on talk shows for her book and the name change and the image and the sort of prepackaged “Diablo Cody” moment that’s happening right now. Because there’s one thing that hype does better than anything else: it kills small movies stone cold dead.
Let's set aside the crushing weight of expectations.
Is this a good script? Is JUNO a good film?
I'll say this much... I think JUNO is a massive leap forward for Jason Reitman as a director from THANK YOU FOR SMOKING. I think his first movie is exceptionally clever. But I think clever only gets you so far. I think JUNO is also clever, but tempered with a sympathetic ear for unsympathetic people, no simple trick. The difference is, of course, that Cody’s script is much more unruly than THANK YOU FOR SMOKING. It’s charming because it stubbornly refuses to be the film it should be by every rule of Hollywood. It’s a warm film. It’s affectionate towards its characters, but it’s also unflinching. I think Jason Bateman does great work here as a guy who simply... fails. He’s a good guy in a lot of ways, but he’s a dumbshit and a coward in other ways. And the way Bateman plays him, I don’t blame him at all. It’s just who he is. In fact, that’s the key to the script that Cody’s written. This is a film about people realizing that they need to really be who they are, and the things they do to make that happen. It’s that simple awakening that spreads like a virus that makes the film more than just a bunch of punchy rapid-fire dialogue between pretty much a laundry list of some of the best and the brightest working right now: Ellen Page, Michael Cera, Olivia Thirlby, Allison Janney, J.K. Simmons, Rainn Wilson...
... and, yes, Jennifer Garner. The consistently underrated, consistently undervalued Jennifer Garner. The trailers for this film are all focused on Ellen Page, and rightfully so. She’s Juno, after all. And she gives a slam dunk of a star performance. The role is such a great sassy showcase that it’s almost too easy.
But Garner? Garner’s playing a role that is next to impossible to pull off. I can’t really explain without getting spoilery, so be warned. She’s presented as such a control freak sort of desperate career woman at the start of the film that it’s hard to imagine that she’ll be likeable. And especially with Jason Bateman as her husband, the “cool guy” who is way more laidback than his “uptight” wife. But the way the film plays out, Garner is revealed to be the heart of the film. Juno may be a brainy little thing, but once Garner connects, it’s her movie. The last act of the film, she really steps up. It’s moving, lovely work, some of the best she’s done.
I think Michael Cera is a secret weapon still. I don’t think everyone understands yet how insanely great this kid is. He’s really sort of amazing in every scene he has here. In fact, in my house, I’ve created a new rule which says that any time anyone makes any reference to Michael Cera, they are required to preface his name with the modifier, “The Great.” As in, “Oh, yeah, I loved SUPERBAD starring Jonah Hill and The Great Michael Cera.” Easy enough, right? And seriously... he’s that good in this. Paulie Bleeker is not George Michael. He’s not Evan from SUPERBAD. Bleeker’s a totally different specific kid, and just as a sight gag, Cera really nails it.
Reitman’s got a completely different sensibility than his father did. Ivan Reitman’s early films were technically raw to the point of being sort of inept, and I think his best-looking overall film remains GHOSTBUSTERS, where he reached the height of his craft, although one has to wonder how much free reign his FX department had to craft the stuff that’s the most cinematic. With Jason Reitman, I get the feeling he’s trying to make films that matter to him, not CAA packages that come attached to a greenlight, and not just a star vehicle. I think it’s impressive that he’s managed to establish his own identity in just two films as a director, and I hope he stays the course... I hope he doesn’t turn into a guy cranking out empty studio comedies for years. I think he’s more interesting than that.
I respect his taste in attaching himself to Cody’s script. This is the sort of film that is all dependent on finding the right cast and knowing what tone everyone should be playing. It’s fun writing that doesn’t really sound real at first. Lots of slang. Lots of attitude.
And then over the course of the film, the slang and the attitude sort of drop away, and things get increasingly real. Recognizable. It’s a nicely written script in the sense that I think it’s very rigidly structured, but it feels like it’s loose and unpredictable. It knows where it’s going from the very first frames, and I think the payoff to it all really works. More than that, I think it's got some fairly sigificant things to say, although it whispers them. The messages that are here are subtle ones, never preachy.
I don’t know if I think JUNO is one of the year’s very best films. I certainly admire and enjoyed it, and I can’t wait for DVD to show it to my verrrrrrrrrrrry pregnant wife, who can’t get to the screenings with me at all anymore. I hope JUNO finds a wide audience. I think that, once you strip all the hype away like I did at the start of this, JUNO is a solid, smart, sweet film, one I’m glad I saw. Really... beyond that, do you need any hyperbole? Any at all?
Drew McWeeny, Los Angeles
Drew McWeeny, Los Angeles
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Rather than people speaking dictating how movies sound. Slang and attitude make me shudder because nothing could be more disengenuous. With that said I'm still dying to see this, but based on mori's review I doubt it will be cracking my best of the year list.
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And I just spent five minutes reading the article. Well, McWeeny says it's good so who am I to argue with the man?
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...Moriarty says "I don’t know if I think JUNO is one of the year’s very best films." He's spot on about not knowing if he thinks. Its nice to see that Michael Cera is really sort of amazing in every scene he has here. Just like I sort of might even say that possibly this review could maybe be definately the worst review article I've read in the last few, well honestly, hours.
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Don't worry buddy, I'm sure Harry will write a post comparing some random action film to a pussy soon enough, then you can be happy too.
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...but how does it end? ;-)
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I saw Juno at it's world premiere at TIFF this year and after it ended I just remember this warm feeling coming over me in the realization that I had just seen a perfect film. Well perfect except for Rainn Wilson (who I do like, but just think he was miscast and sets the wrong tone).
Michael Cera will break your heart in this film. He's that good. Ellen Page is, of course amazing, but you all know that by this point in time. It's impossible to say that anyone "owns" this film due to their performance because everyone is just so good - they all own it. It's a gem of a film, and I'm also worried that the hype will hurt it more than help it. -
Really.
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ugly bitch ruined alias
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In every other review I've seen, They make a huge deal out of Ellen Page's performance while briefly acknowledging the good work done by the other actors. Yet in your review, it seems to be the opposite, with Page's role being "too easy". Do you think she's getting too much attention?
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Juno and her dad may speak in a a kind of snappy patter to each other, think shades of Tracy/Hepburn, but I read it is more of way that they have bonded to deal with the hurt of losing their wife/mother.
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Is the dialogue realistic or is every line some witty wisecrack that sounds written?
BTW, Diablo Cody is getting really annoying with her "I'm not hip, so that makes me really hip" routine. -
Because 'Juno' looks like a good movie!
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For sure. When she walks into the convenience store to get the pregnancy test while drinking Sunny D and has an exchange with Rainn Wilson, I almost gagged from the preciousness. They both had the exact same hipster speak (he calls her "home skillet") that just felt like a writer trying way too hard. But while it retained some of that, it also became something much better and more honest. I'm just afraid that it's become hopelessly overhyped at this point. I, too, saw it at the world premiere in Toronto and all I knew about it was what I read in the program book. So, for me, it totally came out of leftfield.
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Saw this at a recent screening. This movie was a HUGE disappointment. Everything about the dialogue (ooh a Thundercats reference) felt false. Why is it that white writers are immediately called "hip" whenever they have their characters say whatever black people were saying 15 yrs ago? "Tore up from the floor up" "Home slice". I can go on and on.. And Michael Cera apparently is the new Jon Heder. The extent of his "acting" throughout the movie, is a constant look of surprise, while wearing short shorts, with the occasional look of terror sprinkled in.
Way to stretch the old acting muscles Cera!! I'll be shocked if he DOESN'T play another loser in his next film. -
I was lucky to catch it during the London Film Festival with a Q&A after with Alison Janey/Diablo Cody & Reitman after.
Despite being completely biased as a huge Alias fan, you're bang on about Garners character and how the roles are reversed between her and Jason Bateman by the end of the film.
The only problem watching it with a packed audience was that people were laughing (terrible I know :) ) all the way through so you found yourself not catching some of the lines. I'll definitely be watching it again once it comes out on general release.
Ferg -
What movie did you have in mind at the end of your Southland Tales review? I'm really curious to know.
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That's what I want to know.
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And it was sheer torture to sit the this trailer. Looks very contrived and horrible.
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Getting tons of publicity right off the bat is usually the death knell for a writer.Remember Shane Salerno?Anyone? Much better to be the person who flies under the radar and turns in a few great scripts, and then when the Oscar nod comes along everyone's like "Oh yeah, he/she IS pretty awesome, huh."
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Dec 05, 2007 11:18:59 AM CST
Ellen Paige's perf. is no "slam-dunk," and Reitman can't direct.
by s00p3rm4n
I don't understand why you people go apeshit for Jason Reitman. Even if he weren't a nepotistically-careered self important twat (in real life, no seriously) he can't direct actors to save his life.
Ellen Page's performance, for one. I don't think it's a "knock-out" "stellar" turn by any stretch of the fucking imagination, and again it's really disappointing that that's what passes for a star-making performance. She's a great actress, and I think she carries the movie, but I think she's got far better performances in her - and in the hands of a capable director (and, AHEM, a better writer who wasn't concerned more with making McSweeney's readers laugh at their own laughing than writing decent characters), this could've been an unforgettable performance in an awesome movie.
The popular opinion is to jizz all over this movie, like so many have apparently done over Diablo Cody (literally or figuratively), and I was definitely entertained - and definitely more than by the genuinely fucktrocious Thank You for Smoking, but I forgot most of this movie a week after seeing it. -
Are you kidding? When Reitman starts actually DIRECTING films and DIRECTING actors, call me about this designation. Until then, it's far too hasty.
"He's like the new Preston Sturges, but not funny!" -
She's in Cyrano on Broadway right now and the NY Times raved about how good she was in it.
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Juno = best picture. saw it three months ago.
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she is too fugly to be a roxanne
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In fact, I enjoyed it.
That said, Cody needs more control and maturity before she'll be a great screenwriter. She does have plenty of talent. -
Hey jivatmax, if Jennifer Garner is your idea of ugly, I'd be curious to know who you consider hot. Your mother? BTW, Garner was good in Cyrano but it's really a showcase for Kevin Kline.
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Again, jivatmax, Jennifer Garner didn't ruin Alias, she WAS Alias. Clearly you never watched an episode. If you're referring to the downfall of the show, that responsibility should be placed on the producers/writers/directors/anyone who caved in to Network demands.
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The trailers make it seem like wall-to-wall cynicism, but the transition that Juno undergoes as she's slowly forced to deal with reality is a joy to watch, leading to one of the sweetest, most romantic endings I've ever seen (right up there with My Sassy Girl). A wonderful film, undoubtedly in my Top 10 for this year. Shit, I hate it when strippers actually have talent.
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But that's just me.
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The first time around I focused on the script and Ellen. It did seem overly clever to me, but there was no doubt in my mind that Ellen Page will get her comeuppance with the Academy for overlooking _Hard_Candy_. Upon my second viewing I paid more attention to the rest of the cast and wasn't distracted by the script. If Ferris Bueller can be so clever, maybe the cast of Juno can, too. As for Jennifer Garner, I was in love with her through the first two seasons of Alias and fell out of love over the subsequent years and bad choices. Last night watching her yearning for a baby made me fall in love with her again.
I'm calling for best actress and best supporting actress for Juno. -
a more detailed... less touchy feely review over at JoBlo. Between these two and a couple of advance reviews I've read, I've heard NOTHING bad about this flick. Michael Cera and Jason Bateman? Sold. Add in the adorable Ellen Page (aka the only bright spot of X3) and it's at least worth a matinee.
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Man, I really loved Juno. Page is amazing; all the supporting cast is great... except for Garner. She did nothing for me. Even her finale was just Meh as far as I'm concerned. This film *is* awesome, but I for one don't get the Garner love/praise. She just seemed flat to me the whole way through. (Or maybe I've just grown to hate her choices too much since loving her in the Alias days...Hmm...) In any case, hooray for Cody, Reitman, Ellen, Cera, C.J., etc. Not so much for Garner.
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Drew, I found it interesting that the bulk of your cleanly written review was devoted to how classy a director Jason Reitman is becoming, and that to enjoy “Juno”, all we need to do is forget the hype. Fox Searchlight and Brooke Busey-Hunt’s publicists have made this an Olympic grade task for moviegoers. Oh, no disrespect to “Diablo Cody”, but until she breaks away from The Police, or cuts an LP as good as “Purple Rain”, I refuse to call people by made up names. Sting and Prince earned that right. It remains to be seen whether Busey-Hunt will. Look, I love movies, and I love women, and would love to see more women writing or directing movies that connect with an audience. I think there needs to be a balance to all the testosterone driven, male oriented blockbusters being produced. But I’ve already seen a screenwriter/director arrive on a wave of hype like this, and it wasn’t Quentin Tarantino. It was Kevin Williamson.The trailers for “Juno” sound a lot like “Dawson’s Creek”, back when Kevin Williamson was employable. Someone in the Talkbacks brought up “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”. Well, John Hughes was able to write seven or eight terrific scripts in a row because he focused on the work. I don’t recall ever seeing him on a talk show. He was probably too busy writing. I’ll wait until “Juno” is released on DVD to give it a shot. I need to go three months without hearing Busey-Hunt referred to as “screenwriter turned stripper” to actually watch this movie with an open mind.
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Drawing me in is not the same as keeping me around, kaspianwithak. If I'm wrong, then Kevin Williamson would be a major force in film and television today. Because, you know, he could write those quips that drew you in.
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The ghosts of Jonathan Swift, Samuel Clemens, Eric Arthur Blair, and a few other scribes might argue that rock stars lifted the idea of a nom de plume from them. It's Diablo's alias, why are you flapping your gob?
Reason number 2 to clamp your gob: I saw Juno, and it rocked. Cody's writing is tight. She has a strong sense of structure. Her characters are distinctive - even the supporting characters with only one strong scene, like Rainn Wilson's convenience-store clerk. She avoids all of the usual routes into stereotype - witness Allison Janney's arc as Juno's stepmother. She has an amazing ear for distinctive dialogue. You try to work "sea monkey" into a 16-year-old girl's dialogue and make it feel organic.
I'm predicting an original screenplay Oscar nod for Diablo Cody.
Oh, and it's not her fault her parents didn't just give her a cool name like Quentin. -
Dec 05, 2007 4:37:25 PM CST
Rainn's opening scene in Juno (spoilers but not the first to spo
by trader groucho 2
I need to take issue with Garbageman and Konigsberg. The convenience store scene with Rainn's clerk and Juno told us that Juno's pregnant and she's freaked about it, but just as importantly, told us we are entering a world where at least some of the characters - Juno especially - have taken in piles of current pop culture (be it urban, '50s Father Knows Best, whatever) and history and school science lessons and molded it into their own linguistic thing (not quite, but approaching a dialect), not because they're stupid and get it wrong, but because they're smart and they're using the language to create their own brand.
Further, the characters are also smart enough to realize it. Late in the second act, when Juno and her dad (JK Simmons) have a heart to heart, he trots out some of the phrases kids these days use. This scene could have gone south in less capable hands, but Cody's script gave the actors the room to find the right notes - dad knows he's not hip and he's trotting out the youthspeak to tease Juno lovingly. Juno knows she's being teased and feels her dad's love and support in that teasing, and takes what her dad's giving as reassuring. Implicit in that exchange is a cross-generational agreement (and Cody earns this with amazing dialogue and well-built character relationships) that every generation of teenagers has to bend the language to their will as a rite of passage, and parents can actually be supportive of that. And you can see it in her dad's eyes when he watches her leave the table.
Now that I'm thinking of it, JK Simmons gave a wonderful performance in this movie too. -
I understand that it's a totally distinctive language that we have to get used to, but why do they both have the exact same vocabulary? Like they'd been friends forever and could complete each other's sentences. The dialogue in that scene couldn't have felt less organic. Don't get me wrong, I loved the movie. That scene just left me cold. Much like the opening scene of Roger Dodger, which felt like a bad Dockers spot. Again, great movie. Bad opening scene.
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What a sad tale.
"Loved GARDEN STATE?
How about LITTLE MISS SUNSHINE?
(I thought they were both pieces of dook, but that's another rant.)
Then you're sure to love JUNO!"
They may as well advertise this crap with those tags because that's exactly what "mini major" studios are doing--making cookie-cutter "quirky"/"hip" pieces of dump like JUNO.
How depressing that the producer sent "Diablo Cody" the GHOST WORLD script to show her how it's done--and then this movie gets produced by the PRODUCERS OF GHOST WORLD!
Talk about irony.
Do yourself a favor--if you're not won over by this twee pablum that the entertainment megacorps are trying to force down your throat, find an ACTUAL independent film to check out and support some time. One that doesn't dress up a conservative message in hipster clothes and language, one that doesn't sell you the whiny soundtrack in the lobby, and one that doesn't need a PR campaign to fool a demographic. -
I had no problem with the opening scene where we find out she's pregnant as she's finding out. I think that the writing was fine. My problem was that I think Rainn Wilson was a little too "big" with his characterization, and at that point in the film I was a little bit worried about the dialouge being too quirky, but once we got to all the other actors and we saw that they knew how to handle it, it was fine. Like I said, I dig Wilson, I just think he was either mis-cast or not reigned in enough. A small blemish on an otherwise fantastic film.
And for you fucking haters. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck.
Cody hasn't earned the hype, sure, she's written one producer script (that I know about), but she's the flavor of the month. This is what we do people, we discover something new and talented, and then we rip it apart and write it off without even giving them a chance to screw up on their sophmore effort.
Those who can't 'do', hate. -
I simply assumed Juno frequented that convenience store and there was some level of familiarity between the clerk who's clearly slumming well below his potential and the snarky teenage customer who's probably been coming to that store for years.
Juno was busy stressing over her pregnancy test, true, but when the clerk's giving her shit about it, she doesn't lash out at him. That indicates a recurring pattern between these two. Also, places like that normally don't let just anyone use the restroom these days. She felt no need to hide this very personal very embarrassing situation from him, which also indicates these two have known each other for a long time.
I should just go to school and get an MFA in screenwriting and do my paper on Juno. -
Konigsberg, I could kiss you.
That phrase should be etched onto the masthead of this website. -
VERY good to see, how i miss thee, Sydney Bristow.
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