Teen pregnancy can be fun! The Obscenely Late Juno review
Apr 18, 2008 | Filed under Movies, Obscenely Late, Reviews
Obscenely Late Reviews are opinions on something that’s been out for long enough that all the respectable blogs and publications have already reviewed it to death.
Honestly, about ten minutes into Juno, I was worried. The dialogue seemed forced, stilted, and was approaching dangerous levels of snark. The main character, Juno MacGuff (Ellen Page), had so far failed to make enough of an emotional impression on me that I really didn’t care that she was knocked-up.To this point, everything had been empty, borrowing from other quirky-protagonist movie playbooks, like Rushmore and Napoleon Dynamite. I wasn’t optimistic. Director Jason Reitman’s last movie, Thank You For Smoking, while slick and funny, suffered from the same problem. The main character was kept at a distance, so I never really identified or cared about what happened to him.
Sixteen year-old Juno finds out that a single night of boredom-inspired pop-pop* with her best friend Bleeker (the always awesome Michael Cera) led to pregnancy. Initially, she’s prepared to “nip it in the bud.” But then, after a very funny sequence involving fingernails, Juno decides to have the baby and give it up for adoption, and it’s right then that the movie finds its soul.
All the ultra-hip dialogue and too-cool snark melts away, and the movie really shows heart and emotion. It doesn’t hurt that the movie is perfectly cast, either. J.K. Simmons and Allison Janney play her protective, but supportive dad and stepmom, and Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner are the richy-rich prospective adoptive parents. The real treat was the surprisingly sweet and relatable friendship between Juno and her best friend Leah, played by Olivia Thrilby. The scenes between them really stood out, and that’s saying quite a bit, since the movie is full of great scenes.
That’s not to say it’s perfect, though. As I said, it takes a while to get going. There’s a particularly awkward expository scene between Bleeker and his mother near the beginning, and the dialogue still suffers from trying-to-hard-to-be-clever syndrome in places. The scene near the beginning with Rainn Wilson as a convenience store jockey is near-grating in excessive hipsterocity. And there’s not nearly enough Michael Cera.
But, it’s impossible to ignore the charms of the movie, or its characters, especially the infectiously optimistic Juno. And it’s really, really funny, too. Given all that could possibly go wrong with the teen pregnancy as comedy premise, Juno really succeeds as an outstanding movie, and is worth the price of admission the DVD cost.
*This is an Arrested Development reference. Arrested Development was one of the greatest shows in the history of television, and it also starred Jason Bateman and Michael Cera. If you’ve never watched Arrested Development, you should be ashamed of yourself as a media-consuming human being.
