Simple, but Sweet Coming-to-Age Story

Rating: 7/10 (20 October 2008)

In the winter, the sixteen year-old teenager Juno MacGuff (Ellen Page) finds that she is pregnant after having intercourse with her best friend Paulie Bleeker (Michael Cera) on a chair. She first decides to abort the baby; later she changes her mind and decides to give the child for adoption. She seeks for a cool couple in the newspaper and she finds Vanessa (Jennifer Garner) and Mark Loring (Jason Bateman). Juno tells the news to her father and stepmother and they support her decision. After successive meetings with Vanessa and specially with Mark along the months, Juno finds that Mark has not grown-up and is not ready to raise her son. Juno comes up to a final decision about the destiny of the baby.
The low-budget independent "Juno" is a simple but sweet coming-to-age story. The narrative is original and effective, with witty and funny dialogs and the characters are believable. Ellen Page performs a typical teenager, annoying most of the time, with moments of maturity and others naive and silly, chasing the "perfect world" that unfortunately does not exist for her baby. The calm and supportive reaction of Mac and Bren is quite unusual but I liked it. Based on a glance in the reviews, I dare to write that this is the typical love or hate movie without mid-term. My vote is seven.
Title (Brazil): "Juno"