UP IN THE AIR
Directed and (co)written by Jason Reitman
Rated R (language and brief dorsal nudity), 109 mins.
* * * * *
The opening moments of Up in the Air are as crisp as anything we’ve seen in recent cinema. As Sharon Jones and The Dap Kings sing a reggae-and-blues version of “The Land is Your Land” quick cut montages of aerial skyline photos flash by until they seem like so many interchangeable computer mother boards. Then Reitman takes us from apartment to a business class airline seat as Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) packs, checks-in, and waltzes through airport security as only a seasoned traveler could do. Clooney wields his roll-on case, slips off his loafers, and snaps open his laptop with the precision of a drill team.
This movie opens sharp and keep its edge. It is one of the smartest American comedies made in quite a while. Some viewers have complained that it doesn’t satisfy as a “romantic comedy.” Get over it and prepare to be challenged a bit—this is a black comedy along the lines of other Reitman projects such as Juno and Thank You for Smoking.
Like the latter film, Reitman’s target is cutthroat corporate America. Bingham is a buttery smooth sleaze ball, a for-hire terminator who delivers the bad news to employees whose companies have decided to fire them. Reitman doesn’t preach at us, but there’s little doubt that he sees Big Business execs as heartless bastards seeking to line their own pockets and using the recession as their excuse. Bingham lays on the smarm as he fires with amoral efficiency masquerading as dispensing new opportunities for those whose lives he’s shattering. In fact, he’s only happy when he’s on the road and spreading bad news. His only regret is the forty-three days per year he’s not traveling; in his bleak Omaha apartment he’s like a sleek panther in a small cage.
Bingham’s conceited complacency is challenged by two women. The first is Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga). Alex is in the same game and is so like Ryan that when she tells him, “Think of me as you, except with a vagina,” we know exactly what she means. The two have a torrid affair, geographical logistics notwithstanding. The second femme fatale is Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick), a whelp just out of college whose plan to rationalize the firing process threatens guys like Ryan and impresses their boss, Craig Gregory (Jason Bateman). Ryan is forced to take Natalie on the road, insecure in the knowledge that he might be downsizing himself if she succeeds.
It would spoil it to say how any of this plays out, but the details aren’t really what makes this film special. Early on, a man Ryan is about to fire looks him in the eye and asks, “Who the f**k are you?” and that’s exactly what we’re asked to consider. Are we what we do? What we know? Our values? (Tough in Ryan’s case as he’s a universe of one.) Who we love? What is need, and what is merely desire? These are questions with which Ryan grapples, especially when he’s doing his moonlight gig as a motivational speaker delivering a cliché-laden spiel centering on a backpack. (Reitman leaves little doubt that he sees motivational speakers as charlatans preying upon morons.) There’s a subplot—not quite as crisply handled—in which Ryan is forced to reconnect with his estranged sisters. Will Ryan will have an emotional breakthrough bordering on values clarification? Stay with it; Reitman mostly avoids easy answers. (In fact, an awkwardly placed montage of recently fired workers, though based on real testimony, seems so mawkishly contrived that one suspects that Reitman simply doesn’t do sentimentality very well.)
There are gaps in the plot and a nitpicker would argue that five stars is one or two too many, but the performances and witty script overcome an occasionally frayed narrative. Clooney is superb as Bingham. He may be the most suave actor since Cary Grant, but he does something Grant seldom did: he plays against type. His Ryan Bingham is swathed in silk, but a crumbled Willy Loman lurks behind the eye bags. Farmiga plays Alex as an ice queen so smart and sexy that she freezes even Ryan’s cynicism. We smell a Best Supporting Actress Oscar here. Anna Kendrick has a harder role and would be a good candidate herself, if her comedic chops were more refined and less histrionic. Her Natalie Keener must convince us that she grasps much of the Big Picture, but that the missing 10% reveals her for what she is: a kid in adult drag who hasn’t found the boundary between surface competence and inner confidence. But give her credit for being noticed at all given the power with which Clooney and Farmiga command the screen.
See this film, but leave your warm fuzzies at home. It is screamingly funny in places, but there’s always a raised stiletto poised above the punch line. Indeed, as Reitman reminds us, in life no one gets out alive.
Directed and (co)written by Jason Reitman
Rated R (language and brief dorsal nudity), 109 mins.
* * * * *
The opening moments of Up in the Air are as crisp as anything we’ve seen in recent cinema. As Sharon Jones and The Dap Kings sing a reggae-and-blues version of “The Land is Your Land” quick cut montages of aerial skyline photos flash by until they seem like so many interchangeable computer mother boards. Then Reitman takes us from apartment to a business class airline seat as Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) packs, checks-in, and waltzes through airport security as only a seasoned traveler could do. Clooney wields his roll-on case, slips off his loafers, and snaps open his laptop with the precision of a drill team.
This movie opens sharp and keep its edge. It is one of the smartest American comedies made in quite a while. Some viewers have complained that it doesn’t satisfy as a “romantic comedy.” Get over it and prepare to be challenged a bit—this is a black comedy along the lines of other Reitman projects such as Juno and Thank You for Smoking.
Like the latter film, Reitman’s target is cutthroat corporate America. Bingham is a buttery smooth sleaze ball, a for-hire terminator who delivers the bad news to employees whose companies have decided to fire them. Reitman doesn’t preach at us, but there’s little doubt that he sees Big Business execs as heartless bastards seeking to line their own pockets and using the recession as their excuse. Bingham lays on the smarm as he fires with amoral efficiency masquerading as dispensing new opportunities for those whose lives he’s shattering. In fact, he’s only happy when he’s on the road and spreading bad news. His only regret is the forty-three days per year he’s not traveling; in his bleak Omaha apartment he’s like a sleek panther in a small cage.
Bingham’s conceited complacency is challenged by two women. The first is Alex Goran (Vera Farmiga). Alex is in the same game and is so like Ryan that when she tells him, “Think of me as you, except with a vagina,” we know exactly what she means. The two have a torrid affair, geographical logistics notwithstanding. The second femme fatale is Natalie Keener (Anna Kendrick), a whelp just out of college whose plan to rationalize the firing process threatens guys like Ryan and impresses their boss, Craig Gregory (Jason Bateman). Ryan is forced to take Natalie on the road, insecure in the knowledge that he might be downsizing himself if she succeeds.
It would spoil it to say how any of this plays out, but the details aren’t really what makes this film special. Early on, a man Ryan is about to fire looks him in the eye and asks, “Who the f**k are you?” and that’s exactly what we’re asked to consider. Are we what we do? What we know? Our values? (Tough in Ryan’s case as he’s a universe of one.) Who we love? What is need, and what is merely desire? These are questions with which Ryan grapples, especially when he’s doing his moonlight gig as a motivational speaker delivering a cliché-laden spiel centering on a backpack. (Reitman leaves little doubt that he sees motivational speakers as charlatans preying upon morons.) There’s a subplot—not quite as crisply handled—in which Ryan is forced to reconnect with his estranged sisters. Will Ryan will have an emotional breakthrough bordering on values clarification? Stay with it; Reitman mostly avoids easy answers. (In fact, an awkwardly placed montage of recently fired workers, though based on real testimony, seems so mawkishly contrived that one suspects that Reitman simply doesn’t do sentimentality very well.)
There are gaps in the plot and a nitpicker would argue that five stars is one or two too many, but the performances and witty script overcome an occasionally frayed narrative. Clooney is superb as Bingham. He may be the most suave actor since Cary Grant, but he does something Grant seldom did: he plays against type. His Ryan Bingham is swathed in silk, but a crumbled Willy Loman lurks behind the eye bags. Farmiga plays Alex as an ice queen so smart and sexy that she freezes even Ryan’s cynicism. We smell a Best Supporting Actress Oscar here. Anna Kendrick has a harder role and would be a good candidate herself, if her comedic chops were more refined and less histrionic. Her Natalie Keener must convince us that she grasps much of the Big Picture, but that the missing 10% reveals her for what she is: a kid in adult drag who hasn’t found the boundary between surface competence and inner confidence. But give her credit for being noticed at all given the power with which Clooney and Farmiga command the screen.
See this film, but leave your warm fuzzies at home. It is screamingly funny in places, but there’s always a raised stiletto poised above the punch line. Indeed, as Reitman reminds us, in life no one gets out alive.
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