Some of us cringe at the thought of air travel. The nauseating food, the security screening, the soulless mall-like flavor of its terminals—but they're all home sweet home in Up in the Air. Ryan Bingham, played with tailor-cut precision by George Clooney, is a man constantly on the road, living gift shop-to-gift shop.
The high point of Jason Reitman's previous film Juno was the young director's ability to ground the phony characters in a detailed and believable world. The density of the trinkets decorating Juno's bedroom, the familiar look of her high school, etc—Reitman utilizes that keen eye to great effect in Up in the Air, establishing a unique world of airport terminals, hotel suites and office buildings in various states of financial collapse. They all feel like the real deal, with invisible traces of artifice. As the film moves from state to state, you can sense the change in just the weight of each backdrop and the decor of the rooms.
Reitman shoots the film from the perspective of a man who sees public spaces as personal, airport terminals as miniature towns. The film's best shot starts in what looks like a regular men's wear store, but five small steps later and we're in a vast airport walkway. It is a world so limited, and yet so diverse. People from all walks of life have traveled through airports, and the film doesn't neglect that. Take your eyes off Clooney for a second, and you'll spot a group of soldiers waiting to board a flight to who-knows-where.
Though Reitman's past works are limited to a bitingly-charming-but-flawed political satire and an annoying after school program for hipsters, my concern about Up in the Air going in didn't have much to do with him. No, it was suspect because of the character the film is centered on: Ryan Bingham is a man who has successfully compacted happy living into a neat little carry-on luggage of near-homeless bliss and enviously banal ambition (to collect 10 million frequent flyer miles). He avoids attachment like it's his religious calling: no material possession, no relationships with even his family. If taken down a predictable path of self-discovery—like the romance with fellow frequent flyer Alex (Vera Farmiga), who describes herself to Bingham as "you with a vagina"—it could've made for a commitment drama as shallow as the character.
To Reitman and co-writer Sheldon Turner's credit, the film smartly focuses more on Bingham's job. He's a gallant terminator, working for an Omaha company that helps other companies downsize. As his boss (Jason Bateman) declares, the recession is like striking oil.
Surprisingly, a topical study of job loss is the least interesting slice of this movie.
Bingham's perfect world is threatened by the arrival of young go-getter Natalie (Anna Kendrick), who not only offers a video conferencing technology that would ground Bingham in Omaha, but also persistently attacks his way of life. In a circular way, the film emphasizes that sudden pull of the rug that renders anyone helpless—even a man as confident and secure as Bingham.
For a lot of screenwriters, a character who structures his life around gaining frequent flyer miles—only buying/renting things from outlets associated with his frequent flyer club—is the kind of quirk that's too quirky to not give center stage to. Reitman and Turner, however, merely use it as a crutch to support the character's philosophy, with hardly any special attention given to said quirk. The pointless accumulation of points is Bingham's quest for superficial status; a kind of elite that signifies nothing but a pretense of exclusivity. At the end of the day, Bingham's life goal is just a wallet-sized card with a function as basic as his driver's license: it gives him some representation of an identity.
It's with that note that Up on the Air really impresses. The film commits to his philosophy without forcing an omniscient being's opinion upon him that dictates what the right way to behave is, as these detached-people stories often do. The downbeat ending is less about a cynical look at love and more about an affirmation of "different strokes." Bingham seems happiest at his most shallow, and only after pursuing something he never even believed in that he finally comes face to face with disappointment and longing.
It's an odd narrative, because it seems to be heading one way and beating the audience over the head with a lesson on companionship and physical human contact, but then—seemingly on purpose—undoes all that by where the main character ends up in. Perhaps it's thematically confused, perhaps it just missteps one too many times, but either way, at the end of the day, I'm pleased that the film is more philosophically stimulating than the premise has any right being.
"Up in the Air" opens December 4, 2009 and is rated R. Drama. Directed by Jason Reitman. Written by Jason Reitman and Sheldon Turner (screenplay), Walter Kim (novel). Starring Anna Kendrick, Danny R McBride, George Clooney, Jason Bateman, Vera Farmiga.
