Anyone who’s read G. Willow Wilson’s wonderful comic ‘Air’ understands the romance of airports and flight. It’s not crazy to say there’s a strange dichotomy between human interaction and personal isolation inside each sterile vacuum of glass and steel. With Jason Reitman’s ‘Up In The Air’ we have a film that implies lightness when really it’s a melancholic look at air travel as both a philosophy, and, depending on how inclined you are, a religion. Oh, and there’s some laughs in there too.
We know Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) loves what most calls arduous. He turns the grind of check-in and sit-down into a performance. A slick montage dance of silky luggage manoeuvres, card swipes, and mantric greetings. He fires people for a living, and here’s he’s downsized the stress of catching a flight and turned it into an art form. In one beautiful composed shot we see him looking out at the planes and runways like some laird of the airs; the airports, his kingdom.
And yet it’s what behind him that speaks more about the man. The milling people caught in silhouette like shades of a life he has no interest in. For someone who spends most of their life moving through the most emotionally vibrant places on earth, he is alone. Disconnected from life, estranged from his family, his home a hotel room. When we meet him, however, things are about to change.
As you’ll come to realise with a movie this unconventional, Reitman takes the familiar and flips it. Looking at our emotional ties from a fresh perspective, much like the aerial city views that mark a new chapter in the story. A meeting in an airport lounge between Bingham and the frequent flyer femme fatale Alex (Vera Farmiga), turns Hawksian. They’re flirtatious like Bogart and Bacall, but it’s dictated by a loyalty card lexicon, size is measured in miles, and the click-clack of keystrokes coordinating business schedules replaces the cocking of a gun.
The bird strike in this movie comes in the form of ambitious Natalie (Anna Kendrick) who ‘types with a purpose’ and allows her complex flow charts to dictate both her business and personal life. It’s her new videoconferencing system that could bring an end to Bingham’s plane tramp existence as well as his dream of hitting 10 million air miles. Tasked with this new protégé, Bingham crisscrosses the country educating her to the realities of his existence. Here the film opens up, scraping the light froth from the top of this screwball comedy cup and taking a harder look at the film’s spiritual heart.
While Bingham does everything possible not to put down roots and commit, he finds himself in a rather unusual simulation of a family. Even though she’s a threat to him, he can’t help but want to protect Natalie and instil some of the compassion that’s so desperately needed in this recession environment. Kendrick is loveably neurotic in the part and does well to set-up an odd couple charm with Clooney, even puncturing his supposedly bullet-proof charm on a few occasions.
Similarly, he surprises himself by drawing closer to Alex, with Clooney making excellent use of his almost apologetic charm and Farmiga oozing sex appeal. It’s such a delight to watch the two sparring seductively – a crooked smile here, a teasing look there – that even though the film doesn’t demand or need one, you’re almost fooled into wanting a happy ending.
It’s a shame then that in adapting the film Reitman has leaned a little too heavily on the word and not the image. Razor-sharp banter is one thing, but when the women come together like a Greek chorus the dialogue turns from deft to on the nose and repetitious. And it’s not like Reitman isn’t assured with the visuals. As a video-firing lead by Natalie turns sour, one simple camera tilt from the anguished face on a computer screen to a distorted figure behind some frosted glass, shows the disconnect in Bingham’s world far better than words ever could.
As Bingham says earlier in the film. His job is to guide these lost souls through limbo and, on a spiritual basis, he too is a wandering soul. Doomed never to find rest. Forced to keep moving like the shark or die. His one act of redemption at his sister’s wedding – his big attempt at something approaching normalcy – is tainted by the eventual outcome of his relationship with Alex. It’s a realisation that there is no such thing as real life for him.
There’s almost a transcendent element to the film, evidenced by the peculiar cameo from Sam Elliot. It recalls his character in ‘The Big Lebowski’ who seemed far more than the simple cowboy who enjoyed imparting wisdom and sipping on a sarsaparilla. It’s something to ponder with the film’s final images of Bingham finding himself back at the airport staring at the timetables, finding his gate, before turning heavenward once again.
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