Review 728: Juno

                                                                                                               Jason Reitman's Juno is a marvel; one of the best teen films to come out in recent years. It's smart, funny and surprisingly touching in ways that I did not expect from a poster with orange and white strips and an offbeat image of title character starring  at the audience.

Juno MacGuff (Ellen Page) is an independent-minded teenager who takes a nine-month detour into adulthood when she's faced with an unplanned pregnancy. With the help of her boyfriend Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera), her supportive parents, pappa Mac (J. K. Simmons) and stepmother Brenda "Bren" (Allison Janney) and her best friend Leah (Olivia Thirlby), Juno embarks on a hilarious and heartwarming quest to find the perfect parents for her baby. She seemingly finds them in the form of Vanessa Loring (Jennifer Garner) and her husband Mark (Jason Bateman) but are they up to the task?

The screenplay by Diablo Cody is simple in its subject matter but gives the viewer a lot of meet to chew on. You can look at it as a film that celebrates life and childbirth or you can look at it as a film about a liberated young woman who makes a choice being liberated. Juno, throughout the film, is depicted as a   It works because it doesn't talk down to teenagers, it treats them with a sensitivity and an understanding that

Juno can also be seen as a meditation on maturity.

One of its innovations is tor provide us with a stepmother who isn't wicked: Juno's parents are divorced and Mac has remarried Bren who while stern is otherwise a reasonable person, clearly loves Juno and only wants the best for her.

Ellen Page  Juno MacGuff is a pretty fly chick. She is just truly herself which is pretty substantial and frightening thing but she has this ability to float along and cover it up by teasing and poking and proding those around her

Michael Cera (fresh off from Superbad)  playing Paulie Bleeker

Olivia Thirby

Jason Bateman & Jennifer Garner are lovely playing Mark and Vanessa Loring, the couple Juno meets to adopt her baby. Outwardly, Mark seems like he'll be a cool dad and seems like a fun person for Juno to hang out with but deep down, he's hiding his own insecurities, he's just too cowardly to admit it. He's almost a child himself, peacocking his room to Juno where he stores his music and guitar collection and his ambition to be a rock star. From his perspective, he has to deal with his high sophisticated wife

Garner, on the other hand, is the mature one. She wants to be a mum 

Allison Janney

J. K. Simmons