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Hit Play: Juno

12/5/2014

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by Cookie N Screen

Everyone is bounding around the idea that Jason Reitman has had a few flips and flops and is running out of steam. Especially because Men, Women And Children, has already had a sharp intake of critical breath as it lands into cinemas today.  But when you look at his body of work, you can't help admire it. Up In The Air, Thank You For Smoking, Young Adult - they are all good, if not great, pieces of work. 

But his shining moment is Juno 

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Juno, starring Ellen Page and Micheal Cera centres on Juno (Page,) a wise cracking independent teenager. Unfortunately, her life is turned upside down when she finds out that she is pregnant. To solve this, she finds a 30 something couple Mark and Vanessa who are willing to adopt which seems great at first, until Juno grows too fond Mark. The film follows the pains and trails that Juno faces during her pregnancy as well as her relationships with her parents, her emotional attachment to Mark and Vanessa as well as her life with Paulie (Cera), her on and off boyfriend and the father of the child. Set to an incredible soundtrack, Juno is a powerful and emotional movie.

Written by Diablo Cody, it is a wonderful movie. Cody’s fresh and Oscar winning screenplay offers are new insight into the world of teen. Juno here is written as a powerful leading lady who, instead of worrying about a male entity in life, has enough nuance to make her own decisions. Page herself, said she picked the role because there aren’t enough of these roles. Juno is an brilliant and realistic portrayal of a teenager in trouble. The film doesn’t fall into stereotypes and it doesn’t rely on a Hollywood depiction of teenage girls. Instead, Cody created a character that is relatable in her quirk and weirdness. The dialogue is snappy and witty and full of genuine laughs as well as some pretty heart rending emotional moments. It is an emotional film that has an epic heart. The combination of Cody and Page, both writer and actress, is easily one of the best in movie history, giving life to a character and her issues.

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Juno, coming out around the same time as Knocked Up, was also hit with critics. Many feel that it glamorized teenage pregnancies and played loose with the idea of abortion. If anything, particularly the end, it did nothing to promote teenage pregnancy. Juno was blamed for an slight rise in teenage pregnancies and conservatives slammed the movie as a cause. Yet again, media and movies were being blamed for people’s actions. Juno here being at fault rather than a horror movie being a trigger for murder. Again, people were looking for an excuse instead of doing that all important thing, education and guiding our children. Juno does the complete opposite, I feel, and instead shines a very real light on pregnancy. There is talk about the difficulty of adoption, pregnancy itself and the constant talk surrounding Juno’s pregnancy. IJuno makes a ridiculously adult and difficult choice through the movie.

Diablo Cody made a whopping statement about the movie;

“"You can look at it as a film that celebrates life and celebrates childbirth, or you can look at it as a film about a liberated young girl who makes a choice to continue being liberated. Or you can look at it as some kind of twisted love story, you know, a meditation on maturity."

Juno is a wicked treat that is a well rounded movie. Director Reitmen truly makes a great movie, guiding some amazing performances from his cast and telling a unique tale. Though it will be dismissed as hipsterish, it is still a must in everyone’s DVD collection. Fast paced yet gentle, Juno can only be blamed for one thing; influence a lot of people to write better and more humanistic movies

Men, Women and Children is out in cinemas now! 

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