21) Up in the Air

Up in the Air (2009)

Director: Jason Reitman

Starring: George Clooney, Vera Fermiga, Anna Kendrick, Jason Bateman


So, continuing my way through the Best Picture nominees I come to the film which was the early frontrunner for the big gong, Up in the Air.

Ryan Bingham (Clooney) is a corporate downsizer, or a career transition councilor, or a termination facilitator. He fires people for a living, going from company to company doing what the bosses don't have the guts to do. His job causes him to be on the road 322 days a year, a lifestyle that he cherishes. Home for him is planes and airports, hotels and hire cars. He dreams of being only the seventh man to reach ten million frequent flyer miles. However, his way of life is threatened when his company considers taking him off the road after the ambitious, young Nathalie Keener (Kendrick) introduces the possibility of doing their job over the internet rather than face to face. So Ryan has to take Keener on the road with him, in the hope of demonstrating that her new way of doing things is not feasible. Meanwhile, his no-strings-attached approach to life is also compromised as he becomes increasingly more involved with Alex Goran, a woman he meets in an airport lounge who shares a similar jet-setting lifestyle.

Jason Reitman, son of veteran comic director Ivan Reitman, has got himself a reasonable hot streak going to start what looks to be a promising directorial career. He's made three feature films; Thank You for Smoking, Juno and now Up in the Air (with the exception of Juno he also wrote their screenplays). Not too shabby a trio to start a career with. Up in the Air has earned him his second Best Director Oscar nomination (his first was for Juno), but as wonderful a job as he has done with this film it would appear unlikely he will get past Kathryn Bigelow or James Cameron to get the gong.

It is a credit to both Clooney and Reitman that Ryan Bingham is actually a likable character. The combination of being someone who fires people for a living and being someone with no desire for real human connection meant there was great potential for him to become a truly despicable character. Even when we see the scenes of Bingham doing his job, talking people around to seeing it as an opportunity rather than a set back, there is a dignity in the way he does it, his ruthless efficiency is matched by an authenticity in the way he deals with people in that very vulnerable situation. Clooney's performance is brilliant, perfectly protraying that charming and charismatic person who can be your friend without giving any real insight into who he is.

A number of critics have alluded to a Spencer Tracy and Katherine Hepburn feel to this film I reckon that is fair enough. This movie does have a classic feel to it and Clooney and Fermiga, who puts in an equally brilliant performance as Alex, are perfect foils for each other. Alex urges Ryan to think of her as being him "with a vagina". In Alex, Ryan believes he has found someone who actually understands the way he chooses to live his life. Anna Kendrick is also great as the Nathalie Keener, trying so hard to put up the cool composed front of Bingham, but lacking the truly hard shell to keep her emotions under control (her sudden emotional breakdown in the airport is both hilarious and a bit heartbreaking). It is no surprise that the three leads in this film are all up for Oscars.

As the son of Ivan Reitman (director of Ghostbusters, Stripes, Meatballs, Kindergarten Cop, Twins), Jason obviously has some connections to the comedy world so it was interesting to see a number of more comic actors showing up in the supporting cast. Jason Bateman from Arrested Development plays Bingham's boss, Bingham's sister is played by Melanie Lynskey (Two and a Half Men), her fiancee is played by Danny McBride (Pineapple Express, Tropic Thunder) and The Hangover's Zach Galifianakis appears as one of the people being fired.

This could end up being one of the defining movies of the last couple of years, particularly relating to the Global Financial Crisis. Funnily enough, this script about someone whose job it is to go around firing people had been kicking around for years and it was only once it got up and running that the GFC hit and it took on a greater relevance. Jason Reitman actually toured around American interviewing people who had recently lost their jobs. Some of the people he interviewed he actually cast in the film, asking them to improvise their responses as George Clooney fired them. Gives a bit more gravity to those scenes knowing that the people being fired are actually reliving real life experiences and sharing the real life emotions they went through.

This is a brilliant film which, despite it's topical but heavy subject matter, manages to maintain a light and breezy tone. It is nice to see a really great, Best Picture quality film, which doesn't feel the need to be heavy. Like I said above, it was the early frontrunner for the big gong, but seems to have lost a bit of momentum over the last couple of months in the wake of the record breaking run of Avatar and the surprise critical success of The Hurt Locker. Even if it doesn't get it though, still very much worth seeing though. A light, very likable and very relevant drama.