JUNO
(Review)

Juno MacGuff (Ellen Page) is pregnant by her track nerd best friend Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera). Certain she can’t possibly be mature enough to raise a child, she scours the Penny Saver for some “Desperately Seeking Spawn” ads, and finds apparently picture perfect couple Mark and Vanessa Loring (Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner) to be the adoptive parents.
The rest is all gestation, hormones, and the vagaries of the human heart.

Jason Reitman’s follow-up to Thank You For Smoking, Juno, displays a snarkily sensitive charm thanks in large part to an Oscar-nominated script by Diablo Cody. Informing the film with a likewise Oscar-nominated turn, Page’s on-point performance has also helped Juno take the Little Movie That Could road previously traveled by Little Miss Sunshine, a road that’s taken it all the way to Oscar Night.
Aside from Best Actress and Best Original Screenplay nominations, the film also got nods for Best Director and Best Picture.
At the time of this review’s writing, it’s also grossed more than $100 million at the US box office, thus turning out to be, much like its title character, a charming anomaly. Little indie movies like this don’t normally gross in the nine figure range. But Juno’s found its audience, and for small movies like this, that’s always a good thing.

As much as Ellen Page takes center stage here (and has got the Oscar nomination to prove it), the rest of Juno’s cast is likewise fantastic, made up of comic gems like Arrested Development’s Bateman and Cera, and Spider-Man‘s J.K. Simmons and The West Wing‘s Allison Janney, who play Mac and Bren, Juno’s father and stepmother. Even Garner—as the woman who has everything she could want, except the possibility of ever being a biological mother—is good here, and I’m not normally a big Garner fan.
Naturally, it helps when the script actually provides the cast with interesting characters to portray. It’s refreshing when a film about a teen-ager doesn’t depict its adult characters (particularly the teen-ager’s parents) as well-meaning, bumbling idiots. Mac and Bren are the sort of parents you’d want to have in your corner, if you ever found yourself in a tight spot: capable, no-nonsense, and funny.
The prospective adoptive couple are likewise not your cookie cutter rich fat cats hungry for a cute little bundle of joy, though they may first appear to be.
And then there’s Juno…

Apparently, Juno has struck a major chord with the American youth. As the film has achieved the movie Nirvana of mainstream crossover success (even its soundtrack has sold remarkably well), it’s turned out that Juno is the sort of teen-aged girl a lot of teen-aged girls wish they could be.
Juno isn’t the kind of teen-ager other young actresses get to play on the big screen. You won’t find Juno in a Lindsey Lohan or Amanda Bynes movie. Think the confidence and self-assurance of Julia Stiles in 10 Things I Hate About You and the alterna-geekiness of Thora Birch in Ghost World, and you’d get a very rough idea of Juno.
Diablo Cody has inadvertently created a surprising role model for young girls, and Reitman found just the right Juno in Page. Film geeks will know her from David Slade’s Hard Candy. Mainstream movie-going audiences will know her as Kitty Pride/Shadowcat from Brett Ratner’s X-Men: The Last Stand. From this point on though, Juno will be the character she’ll be remembered for for the foreseeable future.

Now, when I say that Juno’s become a role model for the youth, I certainly don’t mean 16-year-olds who get to see Juno will suddenly want to get knocked up. I’m saying that in Juno, teen-aged girls can see that if they do end up in a hairy situation (like, though not limited to, pregnancy), that, given a certain level of maturity and a great support system, they can come out the other side of a potentially life-altering turn of events, their sanity and snark intact.

Admittedly though, Juno is, like the Lorings, not exactly picture perfect.
The first scene where we see Juno interact with someone (The Office’s Rainn Wilson) comes off as a tad clunky, with dialogue that feels slightly contrived. But thankfully, things smoothen out as we progress into the film.
Then there’s also the narrative’s approach to the pregnancy itself. There’s a brief flirtation with the reality of abortion, and a cursory reference to it during Juno’s conversation with her parents about her condition, then she’s decided on her course of action, and that’s it. The story’s pretty much locked in on that, and Juno never seems to acknowledge the possibility of how she’ll feel once the child is born, that there will be no succumbing to some inherent maternal instinct that will kick in once her water breaks.
Somehow, this scenario doesn’t quite play out the way the situation would probably unfold in real life. Given the perennially hot-button seriousness of what this film is about, the slightly fanciful approach to the subject matter may strike some as being inappropriate.
Granted, there are some bumps on this road, but by and large, the world Juno lives in seems a whole lot less messy than real life, and the character seems a whole lot more certain than all us normal folk.
Which is probably why she’s become such a role model. So I guess in the end that’s probably a good thing.
(And if it makes any sort of difference, I have less issues with Juno than I did with Little Miss Sunshine.)

Ultimately, Juno is one of those great little indies that has a prickly sense of humour, encased around a heart and soul that’s all warm and toasty.
It’s fun, it’s smart, and hey, it’s crashed the Oscar party.
Now if only the strike would end, so there will be a party for Juno to crash…*

* This review was written before February 12, when the WGA announced that they were ending the strike; see Afterthoughts (51).

Parting shot: Diablo Cody was honoured with the WGA Best Original Screenplay Award, coming out on top of a category that included Tony Gilroy’s Michael Clayton, Tamara Jenkins’ The Savages, Judd Apatow’s Knocked Up, and Nancy Oliver’s Lars and the Real Girl.
Check out Afterthoughts (48) in the Archive for the other wins that made me go “Woot!”

Parting shot 2: Jason Reitman again teams-up with Diablo Cody (this time as producer) for the next movie to be made from a screenplay written by her. Jennifer’s Body (which found a spot for itself on the Black List 2007), has been described by Reitman as “what if Juno was possessed and started eating her classmates,” or something to that effect.
Last I heard, Transformers hottie Megan Gale was playing Jennifer.

(Juno OS courtesy of impawards.com; Ellen Page EW cover courtesy of ew.com.)

LOST
Season 4 Episode 1
“The Beginning of the End”
Written by Damon Lindelof & Carlton Cuse
Directed by Jack Bender
(WARNING: SPOILERS)

(SERIOUSLY.)

Thus does the Mystery Box that is Season 4 open, and even as we pick up from where we left off on the Island, we get a flash-forward with Hugo front and center, timeline, somewhen before the Season 3 finale flashforward.

While Jack and company at the radio tower are awaiting rescue, Hurley and the Beach Patrol meet Des as he rows ashore, only to learn that Naomi’s been a lying little b!tch and it isn’t Penny’s boat out there at all, and oh, by the way, Charlie’s dead.
That’s one of the episode’s great moving bits, as we see the news clearly hit Hurley, hard. And since Sayid votes against radioing Jack with that bit of news (suspecting that these new interlopers are keeping tabs on their transmissions), and besides, Hurley smacks the walkie talkie out of Sawyer’s hand and into the water, the Beach Patrol heads out to warn Jack (which is the episode’s fantastic boo-yah! moment as everybody starts arming themselves as they head on out into the jungle).

On the trek, there another nice bit as Sawyer clearly shows concern for how Hugo’s taking Charlie’s death. It’s nice to know the con man can be a person too…
But because Hurley lags behind the rest of the Beach Patrol, he ends up getting separated from them, and finds himself… right outside Jacob’s cabin!
And when he looks in one of the windows, he sees Jacob! There’s also someone else in the cabin, who scares Hurley, who then scampers off. But he somehow finds himself back outside the cabin again.
So he shuts his eyes, tells himself there’s nothing there.
And Locke finds him. (Now, I couldn’t tell if that other someone in the cabin was Locke. It could’ve been…)

Meanwhile, it turns out Naomi wasn’t dead after all, and she seems to have crawled away while no one was looking… (Wow. Dying girl on stealth mode…)
Danielle finds a trail of blood, but Kate finds another trail and suspects that Naomi made a fake trail to throw them off her scent. Jack however, doubts this whole “fake trail” scenario, and opts to follow the obvious blood trail, with Danielle and Ben in tow, sending Kate off with the others to head back to the beach.
They hug and they part.
It turns out though, that Kate was right, and she filched the NaomiPhone from Jack during the hug. Kate finds the bleeding Naomi in time for Naomi to fiddle around with the frequency of the NaomiPhone’s signal emitter (or some techy gobbledygook like that) so the Boat People can find them, then tells the dude on the other end to tell her sister she loves her, before she dies.
For real this time.
Apparently.

All the parties intersect in the jungle, near the 815 cockpit, and there’s another moving bit as Claire is clearly looking around for Charlie, and Des looks like he’s moving towards her, but Hurley says, “I’ll tell her.”
And he does…

Then, to balance out all the sniffly moving bits, Jack punches Locke, then points a gun to his head. Locke says “You won’t shoot me, Jack, any more that I would have shot you,” referring to Season 3’s finale.
But in what’s arguably one of the episode’s biggest shocks, Jack pulls the trigger. But the gun isn’t loaded…
So Jack starts wailing on Locke instead, but he’s pulled off Locke (who didn’t seem to be fighting back anyway).
Locke makes his pitch: I’m trying to keep everyone safe, and those Boat People are not who they say they are, and they’re bad. I’m going to the now abandoned Dharma barracks, which is defensible, and I’m going to come up with a plan. Anyone who wants to stay alive, come with me.
And the tribe splits.

With Locke: Hurley, Claire, Sawyer, Danielle, Alex, Karl, and Ben (who amusingly asks Jack’s permission to take his leave).
With Jack: Kate, Rose (who refuses to go anywhere with Locke), Bernard.
These are the people I’m certain of. I missed some of the others during the exchange, though I assume that Sun, Jin, Juliet, and Sayid, are with Jack’s group. (Not quite sure where Des ended up…)

After a brief interlude at the remains of the cockpit, where Jack and Kate recall all the way back to the Pilot, traveling here with Charlie, Jack hears a helicopter, and they see someone land in a parachute, and Parachute Guy takes off his helmet, and he’s Jeremy Davies!
And he asks Jack, “Are you Jack?”
Which is the episode’s cliffhanger.
But let’s go back to the future, shall we?

Hurley’s chased by the police after he tears out of a convenience store, having seen someone (or something) that spooked him. Just as he’s arrested, he’s shouting, “I’m one of the Oceanic Six!”
At the police station, he’s interrogated by Ana-Lucia’s former partner, but he goes looney when he sees someone swim up to the mirror and touch it, letting tons of water into the room. This is, of course, apparently all a hallucination, and Hurley is only too grateful when they send him back to the same loonybin he spent some time at before. (Sniff. I miss Libby.)

While there, a mysterious stranger who claims to be a lawyer for Oceanic (introducing himself as Matthew Abaddon, creepily played by The Wire‘s Lance Reddick) offers Hurley an “upgrade”: a better loonybin to recuperate in.
Well, that’s… thoughtful.
But Hurley smells something suspicious, and when he says, “Okay, we’re done,” Supposed Oceanic Lawyer Guy asks, “Are they still alive?”
Hurley freaks, and SOLG makes his escape.

Later on, one of the other residents warns Hurley to be careful, “‘cause someone’s watching you.” And when Hurley looks, it’s (and this is the episode’s other possible biggest shock) Charlie! (With a cool, short haircut!)
So Charlie claims he is dead, but he’s also right there, and slaps Hurley to make his point. (And the other loony did see Charlie, right? So Charlie wasn’t a Hurley hallucination. Of course, the other guy who saw Charlie was loony…)
Apparently, Charlie’s who Hurley saw at the convenience store, which made him hightail it out of there. Charlie says to Hugo, “They need you.”
But Hurley’s having none of that sort of talk, so he shuts his eyes and counts to five, and when he’s done, Charlie’s gone.

Later on still, Jack pays Hurley a visit. (Jack saw the car chase on TV at the top of the episode.)
It’s a great scene, as we see a whole lot’s changed since the Island, and Hurley apologizes for going off with Locke, and says he should have stayed with Jack. Jack says it’s okay and that’s all water under the bridge.
But even as Jack’s leaving, Hurley says “It wants us to come back,” or something to that effect, and at this point in time, Jack doesn’t want to hear it, and leaves…

Now, though the episode’s teaser (the car chase leading up to Hurley’s arrest) is arguably not as strong a season opener as either Season 2’s (the inside of the hatch) or Season 3’s (the Others witnessing the 815 crash), the episode itself is solid enough, giving us some teasing bits to gnaw on: so what’s the “Oceanic Six”? Did they claim to the public that only a half dozen survived the crash?
Why does Supposed Oceanic Lawyer Guy ask, “Are they alive?” Did some characters lose themselves on the Island? Did Jack, Hugo and the rest of the Oceanic Six cover up for those other people? (I’m also going to assume that Kate is one of the Six, as we see her off the Island in the Season 3 finale flashforward. Speaking of Kate though, I’m surprised that when she’s asked over the NaomiPhone who she is, she actually gives her real name…)
And speaking of names, with a name like Abaddon, how can you seriously trust Supposed Oceanic Lawyer Guy?

It also struck me that back in Season 3, Ben talked about needing to sacrifice something in order to join them, before telling Locke he had to kill his father to do so. And Ben killed his father as a sign that he was joining Richard’s crew.
Must one always kill the father? Again, with the Daddy issues…
Also (and this is something I brought up before), doesn’t it make a difference that Locke didn’t do the deed himself? That he got Sawyer to get his hands dirty?

Getting back to this episode though, I’m jazzed that Davies has already been introduced, as I do think he’s one of the better young actors out there who always brings something edgy and dangerously unstable to his performances.
And speaking of “dangerously unstable,” I also loved that bit where Hurley sees Jacob.
Does one have to be slightly mentally unbalanced to see Jacob? One must admit, both Ben and Locke can seem a tad loopy at times.
And there’s the Charlie “yes, I’m dead, but I’m also here” bit. Is that what the Island (and/or Jacob) can do? Does that explain why Christian appears in the final mobisode, on the Island, at the moment of the crash? Is Vincent slightly mentally unbalanced too, since he apparently saw Christian as well?
Where is that damned dog, by the way? Did anyone see him in this episode?

Parting shot: Speaking of Christian, didn’t John Terry’s name pop up during the opening credits? Wasn’t he at the tail end of the regular cast?
Since he didn’t show up in this episode (or did I blink and miss him?), does that mean we’ll be seeing more of Christian later on in Season 4? On the Island or off the Island? Dead or alive? Or like Charlie, “dead but here”?

Post-parting shot: During the usual lag time between when I get to watch something and get to write a review for it, and when I actually get to post the review, something happened.
It was brought to my attention (thanx, Mika!) that the guy in the chair in Jacob’s cabin was actually Christian. (There’s a screenshot up at wikipedia.)
So if that was Christian, my question at this point is: was that really Christian, or was that Jacob somehow using the form of Christian? And that question also goes for all the other dead people that have been seen by the living throughout Lost: Charlie, Yemi, Ben’s mum.

COUNTDOWN: 47.

(Lost Season 4 ad courtesy of impawards.com; image courtesy of ew.com.)

AFTERTHOUGHTS (51)

51.1 THUS ENDETH THE STRIKE
So the count last Tuesday night: 3,492 to 283, in favour of ending the strike during the ratification process.
It’s officially over and the writers can get back to work Wednesday. Some, in fact (like the writers for the upcoming Oscar night) were already in the thick of things late Tuesday night.
Now, as the two week ratification of the proposed three-year deal takes place (votes for that to be tallied on February 26), Hollywood gets back into the swing of things, which leads us rather neatly to…

51.2 REVVING THE POST-STRIKE ENGINE (1)
LOST
Showrunner Carlton Cuse has already made the announcement that they’re aiming to come up with 5 post-strike episodes, so this season will end with 13 episodes.
Intending to wrap the season up at the same narrative point it was originally supposed to end at, there will be some storyline compression required. Hopefully, that won’t have an adverse effect on the story’s rhythm. And hopefully, writers, cast, and crew won’t run themselves ragged to get those episodes ready to keep the consecutive airing of Lost an on-going concern.
Cuse also indicated that the 3 AWOL episodes (since season 4 was meant to be comprised of 16 installments) will pop up somewhere down the road, so we’re still going to get the same number of Lost episodes we were meant to get, before the strike stepped on the brakes.
In an ABC press release, the network has also announced it’s picking up Lost for a fifth season, though I’m uncertain if that season kicks off this Fall, or will have a delayed start date, as per the current season.

PUSHING DAISIES
In the same ABC press release, Pushing Daisies was also announced as having been picked up for a second season.
Thus, there will be no more episodes beyond the 9 pre-strike installments for the current season.

CHUCK
NBC’s Chuck is also expected to return in the Fall, so the first season topped off at 13 pre-strike episodes.

HEROES
Meanwhile, Volume Two’s 11 episodes are pretty much Season 2.
Volume Three: “Villains” will presumably kick off Season 3 when Heroes returns in the Fall.
In preparation, Tim Kring is reportedly getting busy on a series Bible, an always indispensable tool for shows like Heroes.

So with the picket signs being put aside, I’ll be having irregular updates for any strike-affected projects that are on my radar (like the Justice League film) as reports and announcements are made.

Let’s all breathe a huge sigh of relief that it’s over, and that apparently, the writers got a deal they can call a triumph.
Admittedly, not the total victory they were first targetting (reality and animation writers—who have been likened to the sweatshop equivalents of the Hollywood writers world—are still not covered by the guild, one of the aims the WGA had hoped to achieve), but the strides forward in new media seem to be cause to cheer.

Now let’s all hope the upcoming SAG negotiations don’t run into any speed bumps…

(Images courtesy of variety.com [WGA strike is over]; impawards.com [Lost]; avclub.com [Pushing Daisies]; aintitcool.com [Chuck]; and yahoo.com [Heroes].)

AFTERTHOUGHTS (50)
THE BEST OF THE VES 2008

And while Sunday night meant the BAFTAs for British film geeks (see Afterthoughts (49) in the Archive), over in La-La Land, American film geeks looked to the Kodak Theatre, where the 6th Annual VES Awards took place.
This year, the Visual Effects Society favoured Michael Bay’s Transformers with four awards, including the big one, Outstanding Visual Effects in a Visual Effects Driven Motion Picture.
Beyond Transformers though, the win that really made me go “Woot!” was…

Battlestar Galactica: Razor:
Outstanding Visual Effects in a Broadcast Miniseries, Movie or Special (Mike Gibson, Gary Hutzel, Sean Jackson, Pierre Drolet)

But, just for the record…

Transformers:
Outstanding Visual Effects in a Visual Effects Driven Motion Picture (Scott Farrar, Shari Hanson, Russell Earl, Scott Benza)
Best Single Visual Effect of the Year [Desert Highway Sequence] (Scott Farrar, Shari Hanson, Shawn Kelly, Michael Jamieson)
Outstanding Models or Miniatures in a Motion Picture (Dave Fogler, Ron Woodall, Alex Jaeger, Brian Gernand)
Outstanding Compositing in a Motion Picture (Pat Tubach, Beth D’Amato, Todd Varizi, Mike Conte)

Additionally, the award for Outstanding Animated Character in a Live Action Broadcast Program or Commercial went to Nicklas Andersson, Mike Mellor, Sylvain Marc, and Florent DeLa Taille, for the Fatlip shots in Chemical Brothers – Salmon Dance.
Not exactly sure what that is, but hey, it’s the Chemical Brothers…

Steven Spielberg was also honoured with the VES Lifetime Achievement Award, for “the contribution that his vast body of work, as both a director and producer, has made to the art and science of visual effects.”

On the downside though, I’d just like to say it’s such a sad thing that not only did Zodiac get no love from the Oscars this year, but VES passed it over too.
Zodiac was up for Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Motion Picture and Outstanding Created Environment in a Live Action Motion Picture (for Washington and Cherry), but lost out to Ratatouille and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End (for The Maelstrom) respectively.
It’s pissy since David Fincher’s use of visual effects in Zodiac is so seamless, it’s practically invisible. I guess VES gave him an invisible award too…
Don’t worry, Mr. Fincher, the Iguana luvs ya…

For a downloadable PDF of the complete nominee list, go here, and to see a complete list of the winners, go here.

Parting shot: Reviews of Razor, Transformers, and Zodiac can be found in the Archive.

(Battlestar Galactica: Razor DVD cover art courtesy of amazon.com; Transformers OS courtesy of wildaboutmovies.com; and Zodiac OS courtesy of impawards.com.)

AFTERTHOUGHTS (49)
WHAT THE BAFTA?! 2008 (3)

Sunday night in London saw the BAFTAs handed out, and the wins that made me go “Woot!” were:

Control:
The Carl Foreman Award [for Special Achievement by a British Director, Writer or Producer in their First Feature Film] (Matt Greenhalgh, Writer)

The Golden Compass:
Special Visual Effects (Michael Fink/Bill Westenhofer/Ben Morris/Trevor Woods)

Juno:
Original Screenplay (Diablo Cody)

No Country For Old Men:
Director (Joel Coen/Ethan Coen)
Supporting Actor (Javier Bardem)
Cinematography (Roger Deakins)

This Is England:
Best British Film (Mark Herbert/Shane Meadows)

Not surprisingly, The Orange Rising Star Award, voted for by the public, went to Shia LaBeouf.
Sorry, Shia, but I was kind’a rooting for Sam Riley. Ah, well…

Congratulations to all the nominees and winners. You can check out the complete list here.

Parting shot: Reviews of Control, The Golden Compass, Juno, No Country For Old Men, and This Is England can be found in the Archive.

(OS’s and Control and This Is England UK quads [designs by All City] courtesy of impawards.com.)

AFTERTHOUGHTS (48)

48.1 WGA 2008 (2)
Just a few minutes before the start of the crucial WGA meeting last Saturday night to discuss the details of the tentative agreement that could put an end to the three-month long strike, this year’s recipients for the WGA awards were announced, and I’d just like to congratulate Joel and Ethan Coen, for winning Best Adapted Screenplay for No Country For Old Men, and Diablo Cody, for winning Best Original Screenplay, for Juno.
You can check out the complete list of winners here.

Now let’s all hope for the best with the on-going WGA ratification of the current on-the-table deal…

48.2 IN OTHER AWARDS NEWS…
… No Country For Old Men was also honoured at this year’s Producers Guild Awards. It’s now received awards from all four major guilds, SAG, DGA, WGA, and PGA.

Meanwhile, over in London, where the BAFTAs were handed out Sunday night (check out Afterthoughts (49) in the Archive), Guillermo Del Toro’s El Laberinto Del Fauno was honoured with this year’s BBC Four World Cinema Award, emerging at the top of a shortlist that included Turkey’s Iklimler (Climates), Germany’s Das Leben der Anderen (The Lives of Others), Thailand’s Sang Sattawat (Syndromes and a Century), and the French-Italian co-production, La Science Des Reves (The Science of Sleep).

To all involved in both films, a hearty round of congratulations.

And on a BAFTA sidenote, Florian Henckel von Donnersmarck’s Das Leben der Anderen took home the Film Not in the English Language Award last Sunday, as it did the Best Foreign Language Oscar last year.

Parting shot: Reviews of El Laberinto Del Fauno, Juno and No Country For Old Men can be found in the Archive.

(All OS’s and Pan’s Labyrinth UK quad [design by All City] courtesy of impawards.com.)

IN MEMORIAM

Roy Scheider
November 10, 1932 – February 10, 2008

(Image courtesy of royscheider.net.)