The most relevant movie of the year

Rating: 8/10 (13 January 2010)

For such a new director, Jason Reitman certainly had the string of hits. Starting with corporate-sleazeball-with-a-heart gem Thank You for Smoking, and continuing with Oscar-nominated hipster fuel Juno, his third film, Up in the Air certainly had a lot to live up to. While skewing more towards his first film than his more popular second, Up in the Air is still a moving, funny and, most impressively, relevant drama.
The film focuses on Ryan Bingam, a man whose job it is to fly around the country firing people. Ostensibly, he helps them find new jobs (relocation services), but for the most part, its to help supervisors too cowardly to fire their own employees. Due to his job, he lives in airports, spending at least 300 days of the year in the air. He's saving up for record-high air miles, he has gold cards to all major hotels and car rental services. He gives motivational talks on how baggage such as family, friends and any commitments in general.
Of course, whenever we are introduced to a character like this, we immediately know that something or someone will change him over the course of the film. In this case, there are two. The first is Alex, a woman Ryan meets in a hotel bar and proceeds to wildly forrnicate with. Like him, she spends much of her time in the air. She has gold cards, texts dirty and refers to herself as Ryan, "but with a vagina".
The second is Natalie Keener, a new and fresh employee at Ryan's company. She has the bright idea of cutting air travel costs by doing all firings over webcam, which Ryan opposes due both to concerns of the quality of job decreasing plus (mainly) how it would ruin his lifestyle. To show her the ropes, Natalie is forced to shadow Ryan on his trips in order to learn the ropes, during which time she learns the harsh reality and Ryan learns the follies of his ways.
It sounds cliché, I know, but honestly it goes in some unexpected directions. I highly doubt anyone would have expected the ending to be the way it is based solely on trailers. It does stretch a bit at the end, and perhaps is a bit too vague in the ending, but it usually has a good pace to it and is overall quite clever, and often funny.
The movie also happens to be incredibly relevant given the current economy, as a major focus is the moral decay inherent in making a living taking away the jobs of others. The fired employees are all played realistically (even Zach Galifinakis) and never too over the top. JK Simmons in a cameo is particularly effective. The little documentary-style compilation at the end is a bit much, but this may be the movie to sum up the year 2009 perfectly.
The cast is by all means excellent. Clooney plays Ryan as very confident and self-centered, yet rarely does he come across as selfish. Its the kind of role Clooney specialises in, and he's damn good at it. Farmiga basically plays a female Clooney, and manages to keep up with him somehow. Jason Bateman is unfortunately underused as Ryan's lazy boss. The true standout is Anna Kendrick as the naive Natalie who, despite an annoying crying scene, steals the show.
Up in the Air is by all means an excellent film and one of the most relevant of the year. In ten years, if someone asks me for one movie to sum up 2009, this will be that film. Maybe not the hipster breed some Juno fans might expect, but for a trip into the lives of the busy, look no further.