"Up in the Air" - Two Sell-out Thumbs Up

[Time for a non-HCR post.]

Saw "Up in the Air" on Sunday and was deeply impressed.  There is a lot more weight to it than you might expect and an unusual balance between humor and melancholy.

At the center of the movie, of course, is George Clooney, who is a real movie star but with the soul of a character actor.  Clooney looks ridiculously, effortlessly, criminally handsome.  He's got that Cary Grant quality -- an easy masculinity, confident of his presence but without any sense of vanity.

Clooney plays Ryan Bingham, the most rootless of characters, a hired gun who specializes in firing people for companies run by people who don't want to be the trigger-men.  Bingham is most comfortable on the road, a world of first class flights, Admiral's Club lounges, Hilton Honors suites, and Hertz #1 Club full sized sedans.  (This is possibly the most shameless product placement movie in history and yet it sacrifices no artistic integrity in the process.)  When not terminating the redundant, Bingham also doubles as an "inspirational" speaker, a kind of glib, low rent Tony Robbins.  His ethos is entirely based on having no baggage, literally or figuratively, and avoiding the saps in coach.  His ambition in life -- to reach his 10 millionth frequent flier mile with American Airlines.

The few days a year in which Bingham is home in Omaha, he spends in a stunningly non-descript hotel suite, where he has no spouse, significant other, kids, pets, or even pictures on the wall.  He is a character who cannot even commit to a color scheme.  (Although he is touchingly loyal to his corporate brands of choice.)

Without revealing anything, Bingham meets two women, one professionally and one romantically, and complications ensue.   Clooney has terrific chemistry with co-stars Vera Farmiga and Anna Kendrick, both of whom play intelligent, driven, appealing women.  

Although in no way an overtly political movie, the view of early 21st Century capitalism portrayed is jaundiced to say the least. 

Clooney somehow humanizes this seemingly distant detached character -- under all of his easy charm, Bingham has a kind of knowing sadness that permeates him, which Clooney conveys in very subtle strokes.  It's an enjoyable movie, but not necessarily a feel good movie.  

If you've seen it or see it, let me know what you thought.

Comments

[Delicious Pundit]

I saw it, recommended. It doesn't feel hopeless, but it is. But that's probably me; the credit sequence reminded me of "Ozymandias."

Also, I wish I liked anything as much as Jason Reitman likes acoustic guitars on a soundtrack.

[Corvus9]

I really don't know what to think of Jason Reitman. At least, in terms of his political leanings. (I really liked Juno.) His first movie was based on a Christopher Buckely book, and I remember him saying in his Fresh Air interview that that book introduced him to the ideas of libertarianism.

But Juno doesn't really scream Objectivist Manifesto to me, being a pretty positive portrayal of lower middle class life and all, and Up in the Air sounds like it is tackling topics that aren't very comfortable ground for a free-market absolutist. Maybe it was just a phase?

[Sir Charles]

DP,

It will be interesting to see what the box office is like. I don't know that I've ever seen a move in this genre -- a strange sort of romantic comedy (?) with characters that you basically like -- that is utltimately pretty dark in its world view.

Corvus,

As Roy Edroso stresses over and over again, it is best not to engage art (even modest art like popular film)strictly through the lense of politics, particularly the personal politics of a film director. Most decent art is more complex than a sort of walking manifesto. (Although I do enjoy the occasional "agit-prop film -- see e.g. Matewan.)

Having said that, this movie is not exactly a love letter to capitalism.

[minstrel hussain boy]

just saw it last night. i enjoyed it. thought that they stayed away from making any overt political statements, but's that's fine, overt can be boring.

this was clooney at his best. the writing was crisp and the direction was good. not oscar stuff, but very well done.

[Corvus9]

Ah, but Sir Charles, I wasn't interested in his work solely through a political lens. As I said, I really like Juno, and that is regardless of Reitman's politics. My interests are more along the lines that Kurt Vonnegut spelled out in Timequake when talking about the art his brother was making: that art doesn't really exist in a vacuum, that we engage in art in order to communicate with the artist, and so we wish to know where the artist is coming from. It helps us to understand what the art means, and gives it meaning to us, because we see how it has value to the artist. Reitman's films seem to have a lot of social commentary, and I am curious whether I am misreading his intent or not. Not that is intent ultimately matters, but it's interesting to know.

[Sir Charles]

Corvus,

We need to get some of those MLA, post-modernist dudes over here, so that we can argue about author and text and all that stuff.

Of course I like to know where artists are coming from politically, but I think it can be a dubious undertaking too. But, yeah, I'd be curious to hear Reitman's take on the film, particularly the Clooney character.

I just don't want to end up listing the 50 best liberal haiku or some such nonsense. I read that shit from time to time and shake my head. How the hell you can take a masterpiece of American literature like "American Pastoral" and reduce it to "one of the 50 best conservative novels" of all time is a sign of being a true philistine.

[Corvus9]

Well, I think you could, conceivably, make a list like that. I think one can say, with little doubt that Starship Troopers is a conservative novel, for instance. (I actually really enjoyed Starship Troopers.) And Slaughterhouse-Five is probably some kind of humanist novel. Many books just have overt political themes that place them within a certain ideology, and they aren't necessarily the worse for it. And many books can't really be pinned to a specific ideology, and are just as great. The problem with those types of list is that they almost invariably turn into "Lists of books I like," and start including non-political work and just stop making sense.

[Sir Charles]

I'm not objecting to the existence of political art. I am actually rather fond of good bits of lefty art be it "The Grapes of Wrath" or "Z" or "Entertainment" by Gang of Four.

What I object to is wrenching something under a political label that results from either a strained or constipated reading of it -- for some reason the invocation of the Sex Pistols' "Bodies" as one of the Top Fifty Consservative Songs leaps to mind.

Mindless reductivism in the name of ideology -- Zhdanovism -- is what I object to. (Not that I think that's what you are doing.)

[Corvus9]

I agree, I was not. But you were kind of implying I was by whipping out the (completely correct) Edroso view. I was merely defending myself by pointing out that such Zhdanovism was not what I was engaged in.

[Eric Wilde]

t we engage in art in order to communicate with the artist

This was the basic premise in my final essay in Aesthetics at college. The professor really ripped me a new hole. Suffice it to say there are other opinions.