New film from director of "Juno" is light on quirk, heavy on maturity
Andrew Crivilare
Issue date: 2/1/10 Section: Entertainment
How appealing can a movie about a guy who fires people for a living and has no other relationships be? With director Jason Reitman's latest feature, "Up in the Air," the answer is simple: very appealing.
The film stars a silver haired George Clooney as Ryan Bingam, a top-notch agent specializing in firing employees of other companies. Bingam lives to move, owning only three suits and on the verge of reaching ten million frequent flyer miles. He is as happy as they come.
Yet any kid in a candy shop has to leave sometime. For Bingam, his wakeup call comes in the form of two women. The first, a nearing middle-aged business traveler named Alex, played by Vera Flemming, acts as a reflection of Bingam and becomes his go-to gal while on the road.
The other woman, a 23-year-old new hire from the Ivy League named Natalie, played by "Twilight's" Anna Kendrik. She serves as Bingam's foil, wrenching his plans by revolutionizing the business of firing with web chats, eliminating Bingam's excuse to travel. But in an act of pity and opportunity, Bingam's boss (played by a wry Jason Bateman) sends Bingam around the country one last time with Natalie to show her the ropes of the firing business.
What ensues is a road trip-style story, where each new encounter pushes the characters further and further outside of their comfort zones, tossing the beliefs and values that once drove them through existence into question.
That said, the film manages to remain uncharacteristically unpredictable and thoroughly enjoyable. Credit for this goes to a humorous script adapted by director Reitman from the 2001 novel of the same name by Walter Kirn.
The story is not entirely new territory for Reitman. "Up in the Air's" Bingam lends himself easily to comparison with another Reitman protagonist, big tobacco lobbyist Nick Nailer of 2005's "Thank You for Smoking," Reitman's first feature.
Both thrive in brutal careers, have a single-track mind, and pass through a midlife crisis by the end of their films. Reitman's talent shows in "Up in the Air" by giving a more realistic, less farcical bend to the film than his previous one, while still managing to avoid the peachiness that plagues so many of the other films this season (i.e. "Avatar")
Of course, I cannot forget George Clooney, who manages to fill out the role of Bingam with a level of charm and vulnerability that never misses a beat.
The real performances that deserve mentioning in this film are those of the dozens of extras that Bingam fires through out the picture. For all but about four, director Reitman used real unemployed peoples, a good number of who were from the nearby St. Louis region, to give a layer of reality that hits home in these days of double digit unemployment.
In a movie season laden with special-effects heavy, overpriced, underwhelming films, it is a comfort to have a movie like Jason Reitman's "Up in the Air" come along and give audiences an example of what a mature, truthful piece of cinema can be.
The film stars a silver haired George Clooney as Ryan Bingam, a top-notch agent specializing in firing employees of other companies. Bingam lives to move, owning only three suits and on the verge of reaching ten million frequent flyer miles. He is as happy as they come.
Yet any kid in a candy shop has to leave sometime. For Bingam, his wakeup call comes in the form of two women. The first, a nearing middle-aged business traveler named Alex, played by Vera Flemming, acts as a reflection of Bingam and becomes his go-to gal while on the road.
The other woman, a 23-year-old new hire from the Ivy League named Natalie, played by "Twilight's" Anna Kendrik. She serves as Bingam's foil, wrenching his plans by revolutionizing the business of firing with web chats, eliminating Bingam's excuse to travel. But in an act of pity and opportunity, Bingam's boss (played by a wry Jason Bateman) sends Bingam around the country one last time with Natalie to show her the ropes of the firing business.
What ensues is a road trip-style story, where each new encounter pushes the characters further and further outside of their comfort zones, tossing the beliefs and values that once drove them through existence into question.
That said, the film manages to remain uncharacteristically unpredictable and thoroughly enjoyable. Credit for this goes to a humorous script adapted by director Reitman from the 2001 novel of the same name by Walter Kirn.
The story is not entirely new territory for Reitman. "Up in the Air's" Bingam lends himself easily to comparison with another Reitman protagonist, big tobacco lobbyist Nick Nailer of 2005's "Thank You for Smoking," Reitman's first feature.
Both thrive in brutal careers, have a single-track mind, and pass through a midlife crisis by the end of their films. Reitman's talent shows in "Up in the Air" by giving a more realistic, less farcical bend to the film than his previous one, while still managing to avoid the peachiness that plagues so many of the other films this season (i.e. "Avatar")
Of course, I cannot forget George Clooney, who manages to fill out the role of Bingam with a level of charm and vulnerability that never misses a beat.
The real performances that deserve mentioning in this film are those of the dozens of extras that Bingam fires through out the picture. For all but about four, director Reitman used real unemployed peoples, a good number of who were from the nearby St. Louis region, to give a layer of reality that hits home in these days of double digit unemployment.
In a movie season laden with special-effects heavy, overpriced, underwhelming films, it is a comfort to have a movie like Jason Reitman's "Up in the Air" come along and give audiences an example of what a mature, truthful piece of cinema can be.
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