By Steve Erickson
George Clooney eases the ride through Jason Reitman’s dissociated dystopia
“Up in the Air” is a comedy, but its vision of a technology-addicted nation could also pass for science fiction — a la David Cronenberg’s “Crash,” in which only the characters’ psychology is futuristic — or even horror. It gets its laughs from characters who suffer profound alienation and isolation from everyone around them, even the people they sleep with or claim to love.
The film, adapted from Walter Kirn’s novel, is full of sharp dialogue exchanges, descended from screwball comedy by way of Billy Wilder and the Coen brothers, but its characters alternate between flirting and passive-aggressive backstabbing. Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference.
Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) pursues a career in which he flies around the country, firing people. He also works as a motivational speaker. He belongs to every travel loyalty program around. His lifetime goal is accumulating ten million frequent flyer miles. He meets Alex (Vera Farmiga) at an airport and becomes attracted to her, although she leads much the same itinerant life.
Ryan’s boss (Jason Bateman) wants to introduce a new technology that allows his company to fire people through webcams instead of traveling from city to city. Natalie (Anna Kendrick), a young new co-worker, accompanies Ryan on one of his trips, soon showing vulnerabilities underneath an icy facade.
Three movies into a career, there are a few qualities that make a Jason Reitman film distinctive. Visual style isn’t one of them. On that level, “Up in the Air” is notable mostly for a handful of scenes chopped into quickly edited bursts. Reitman turns a trip through airport security into a virtual action scene.
The three elements that persist in the director’s work are a reliance on snappy dialogue (drawing on screenwriters or novelists with strong voices), a fondness for fey indie rock and folk, and a conservative — or at least right-leaning libertarian — streak.
The politics of “Up in the Air” are a little more complex than the Sarah Palin-meets-Belle & Sebastian anti-abortion posturing of “Juno.” A real anger at corporate irresponsibility bubbles beneath it. When its laid-off employees start crying or threatening suicide, genuine economic anxieties burst through the film’s cool facade. All along, Ryan seems to realize that he too is eventually expendable.
“Up in the Air” may be economically liberal but socially conservative. Ryan preaches the benefits of a life without possessions, a category in which he seems to include people. Yet the film views this as empty blather. For Reitman, Ryan is pathetic for remaining single into middle age. Alex seems like his female counterpart, but she merely dabbles in the lifestyle that he carries out to its fullest extent. I suppose that by Hollywood standards, it’s refreshing to suggest that men, rather than women, are missing out on something by avoiding marriage.
Without Clooney, this would all be unbearably grim. The actor is immensely likable. Even reduced to the voice of an animated fox in Wes Anderson’s “Fantastic Mr. Fox,” he exudes charm and charisma. However, the film isn’t his alone; Vera Farmiga proves his match as a performer.
It’s hard to critique technology without coming across like a fuddy-duddy, but “Up in the Air” brings a refreshing wit to scenes in which Alex and Ryan face each other and talk while typing on their laptops. In the film’s press kit, Reitman says, “We’re all using our cell phones and twittering and texting… while, in reality, people don’t look each other in the eye much anymore, and we have fewer real relationships. Ryan’s life in airports is a metaphor for that.”
The film takes place in a homogenous corporate dystopia where empty goals like flying ten million miles are all that can sustain a person. We’re not far from Neil LaBute’s “In the Company of Men”; in some ways, the behavior in “Up in the Air” may be worse because it’s not grounded in personal malice.
For the most part, this is a glib film about glib people, but it’s noteworthy for the traps it avoids. At a crucial point, it offers Ryan a chance at a facile redemption, then takes it away. It never directs its characters toward easy solutions. Clooney’s performance may soften the blow — imagine the film with an obese actor in his place — but “Up in the Air” delves into difficult emotional territory honestly.
