Up in the Air

The title of the movie is actually the ending, which leaves the viewer up in the air as to why it ends the way it does. It's hard to believe that the ending my movie buddy and I saw today is "the" ending, rather than one of a multiple choice selection we shoulda/coulda/woulda made had we had a finger on the choice button.

George Cloony is looking a little long in the tooth: he is, after all, a 50's man, and his age is showing, especially when the co-star is SOOOOOO much younger! When she tells her boyfriend "I don't think of him that way: he's old," she means he's OLD. Now, still a handsome man, but he might want to start thinking about age-appropriate roles, as well as age-appropriate co-stars and dates. Men do age well, but they still look foolish dating women who are obviously the age of their daughters, if they had daughters (insert Harrison Ford and the temp lesbian who had a relationship with Ellen to further her career while making the film with Ford). Perhaps the reason George has never married and/or fathered children is so he never has to admit that he's dating a woman young enough to be his daughter. Just a thought.

Anyway, back to the movie. It's an okay plot, but not great. It has some great moments, but doesn't sustain them. The acting is what you expect (George plays every role just the same as the last one, whatever it is), but the young actress who plays Ms. Keenan steals every scene she shares with George and she does it quite handily. It's as if George is playing off her role, rather than her falling in adoration at being in a (gasp) George Cloony film! And the actress who plays his airport pick-up more than holds her own, kicking up the acting and the plot a notch every time she's on-screen. The best scene is the drinking scene, when the youngest member of the troupe shows her lack of employment experience, so typical of today's psycho-babble younger generation of game-changers, in a conversation with George and his pick-up. The cross-generational remarks are hilarious, even more so when combined with the facial expressions that accompany the dialog.

Would I go see it, knowing what I know now? Yep. It's a good holiday break and/or a girls' movie. Guys will sit through it and it'll be okay, but ... it's not a guy movie. Guys have to wait for the new Matt Damon flick, which looks like a great kick-ass macho mayhem movie coming soon to theaters near you.

Warning: if you've recently lost a job, stay away from Up in the Air!!!!! It's about a firm that specializes in firing people and it's very emotional. Somehow, telling someone who's losing a job that it's not personal doesn't sell any better on the big screen than it does face2face.