Young Adult review
With only a few features under his belt, Jason Reitman has become something of a surefire awards darling with each film receiving increasing acclaim and raising the filmmaker’s profile. The efforts where he doubled as screenwriter (the adaptations “Thank You For Smoking” and “Up In The Air”) were both good but I felt received a disproportionate amount of praise, while “Juno” his collaboration with screenwriter Diablo Cody has been unfairly dismissed because of the stylized dialogue. His latest, “Young Adult” has been pegged for awards season (it opens this Friday) but may have a tougher time entering the race because it’s not quite as cuddly as some of the other films. But who gives a shit because it’s probably the best work of Reitman’s career. And Cody’s too. Charlize Theron (in a monster, brilliant performance) stars as Mavis Gary, a ghost writer of young adult novels who decides to return home to small-town Minnesota (from the big city of Minneapolis) to win back her high school sweetheart, Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson) after she receives a mass-email from his wife with a picture of their new baby.
Mavis arrives in town driving past the endless rows of shopping centers, restaurant chains and small town bars and can barely contain the look of disgust on her face. At a local bar she runs into Matt Frehauf (a perfectly cast Patton Oswalt) a disabled geek who got beat up in high school just because some jocks thought he was gay. The two strike up an unlikely friendship as drinking buddies while Mavis spills her plans to win back Buddy to Matt, which he assures her is a very bad idea. The rest of the film follows Mavis making some very bad decisions as she tries to reconnect desperately with her “true love.” Though she can’t imagine why anyone would want to stick around this hick town she still wants her old schoolmates to know that she got out and is living a more glamorous life for it but the veneer of happiness begins to wear off as the difference between how Mavis sees herself and how others see her becomes more apparent. And oh yeah, it gets very uncomfortable. Nearly every scene between Mavis and Buddy had me literally cringing in my seat, biting my knuckles, covering my eyes. It’s uncomfortable because it’s true.
Mavis is not necessarily a sympathetic character but the film doesn’t make her an cartoonish villain either (like a Meryl Streep in “The Devil Wears Prada” or something). In her you can recognize people you may know or even the worst parts of yourself (Personally I can relate to her wanting to leave her small town for a more exciting life in the big city.) The closest comparison I can make is that it’s a female “Greenberg,” another divisive film that some people couldn’t stand because they didn’t like the lead character but I’ve found more to appreciate about with each subsequent viewing. “Juno” often gets criticized for being completely stylized (has no one ever seen “Heathers”? or a Quentin Tarantino film?) but it’s the quiet moments that make the film better than it’s detractors give it credit for. (Jennifer Garner feeling the baby kick, Michael Cera crawling into a hospital bed with Ellen Page, anything with Jason Bateman in it.) With a lesser director, yes, the film might have been unbearable but with Reitman, it works. (See “Jennifer’s Body” for how it could’ve not worked.)
Here, Diablo Cody’s screenplay is a much more confident and mature, full of memorably uncomfortable moments both hilarious and emotional (think the U.K. “The Office”). If it doesn’t silence her detractors, they’re just plain wrong. The film also has a great 90’s soundtrack (Teenage Fanclub, The Lemonheads, The Replacements, Dinosaur Jr.) and strong supporting cast and ending that really seals the deal. Jason Reitman says he’s constantly chasing Alexander Payne — and I saw a lot of “Election” in “Young Adult” — but now he should relax because he’s made the best Payne film of 2011. One of my favorites of the year and one I’m anxious to rewatch soon.
