Movie Review: Juno

I don't get it.... I kept hearing how sweet and great the movie Juno was, but then I also kept hearing, and from multiple sources, how it glorified unwed pregnancy and made it seem all nicey-nicey-happy-ending-la-la. So a while back Mama D mentioned somewhere how much she loved the movie, and that was the kicker for me. I just couldn't see Mama D glossing over a big glamorization of teen pregnancy, so I put it in my Netflix queue. A solid month later I finally watched it... having a hard time staying up after the kids go down lately, but Dadguy was out for the evening with the guys and their Magic cards, and even when I am bone tired fatigued I have a hard time sleeping when he's not home.

I was floored by this movie, it was so touching and honest and beautiful. Glorifying? If it glorified anything, it was touting teens giving up their babies for adoption. I believe the step mom character put it best when she said something along the lines of Juno putting her baby up for adoption was akin to making a miracle out of a garbage dump of a situation. Very inaccurate quote, but you get the picture. And the job that Jennifer Garner, as the adoptive mom to be, was genius. You think you are getting one kind of character, a super-controlling and tightly wound perfectionist... that you end up loving and rooting for. My sister put it best when she pointed out that this was a woman who felt that motherhood was her calling, and was physically denied her dream; she was just trying to stay afloat. Sometimes we, as women, think that if we could just be perfect enough, just keep everything just freaking perfectly right, that your dream of motherhood will come true. Sometimes when one of the most important thing in our lives is out of our control, we clamp down with a vengeance on what we can control. Knowing what I went through for the fifteen months or so that our fourth pregnancy was denied me? Well, I can only imagine what five years and a definite "never," would do to me.

Yeah. I think the problem that this movies detractors had, was that the main character, Juno, was unapologetic, relatively unashamed, and pulled the whole thing off with a good deal of personal style. She paid a steep price, but her life did go on. And I think that may have offended the snot out of some folks. Of course, some folks are looking to be offended, and would be unsatisfied with anything less than a groveling, shamefaced Juno whining and crying through the whole show. Plus, it was funny. How dare anyone find humor in this sort of a situation?

Personally, I would rather a girl watch a movie like this than listen to her fabulously idiotic girlfriends rave about how wonderful it is to be a cute little mommy of a cute little baby who loves them SO MUCH!

There is a bit of language, crude humor and such... but I give it solids all the way around!