Misha Reflects on George Clooney's Up in the Air

Written by Misha Stallworth

Blogs

George Clooney's Up in the Air is one of the Oscar favorites this year, and I wouldn't be surprised if it ended up cleaning up and winning much of what it is nominated for.  I recently watched it and it is extremely well written, visually pleasing, and the acting is amazing.  But how can one not reflect on his or her own life when watching a movie that is all about social attachment vs. detachment, societal expectations for our goals for different periods of life, inter-generational opinions about one another, and has a basis that directly reflects the hard economic times that America is facing right now. I'm going to do my best to do this reflection without giving away plot spoilers, it will be difficult, but if I focus on the feel the movie gave me then I should be able to be successful.

Continue Reading...

 So here's a run down some of the characters just to start to explain what I mean when I say that the movie is very relateable...

Ryan Bingham (George Clooney)- One of the most successful employees of a company whose consultants are hired to fire employees at other companies.  The majority of his time is spent on airplanes and in hotel rooms, which he loves and considers home.  He appreciates the comfort and social interactions that strangers provide because of their temporariness and in my opinion just because he has not met anyone that makes him want more than a temporary interaction, including his own sisters.  In the midst of what seems like a cold-hearted career and isolated life, he takes his position as an opportunity to usher people into the next phase of their lives.  He takes the face-to-face and personal aspect of it very seriously, perhaps because he truly believes that it is compassionate to do so, or perhaps because it is the part of his job that keeps him up in the air (traveling) so to speak.

Natalie Keene (Anna Kendrick)-  A character to make the University of Chicagoan in me proud.  She is us, the perhaps over-educated, ivy league student who is looking to do things more efficiently, to have life built by 26, and who has trouble with being part of the technological age and continuing to understand the human condition.  Natalie is fresh out of Cornell, has followed a boy to Omaha, Nebraska where she expects to get engaged, and becomes Ryan's apprentice after she implements video chatting into their company without having had any field experience.  Now, consultants can fire people online instead of having to travel to do so, it's cost-effective for the company and totally convenient for the employees ;-)

Alex Goran (Vera Farminga)- "Just think of me as you, just with a vagina," she tells Ryan Bingham when he mentions that he wasn't sure if he should call or not after them having had a sexual escapade.  Basically it means, call when you want but call with purpose.  She has the same appreciation for travel that Ryan has and none of the annoying seeming naivity of Natalie.  She is the distinguished, slightly mysterious, clearly successful, older woman.  A grown up: no starry eyes and improbable lists of steps to have taken by 30, only knowledge that 30 came and went and some things happened and some things didn't.

The interactions between these characters is a lot of what makes the movie amazing. Ryan patronizes Natalie and values his life experience above her college degree; Natalie judges Ryan for being "old" and alone, and thinks that he's a terribly misguided person for being closed off to intimate relationships and personal connection, which means for not wanting to get into serious relationships and/or get married and have kids.  Alex brings out of Ryan the things that Natalie thinks don't exist in him, particularly an ability to be intimate (though not in the way a lot of us 20 somethings think about intimacy, they weren't up late giggling on the phone sharing secrets or anything lame like that).  And with Natalie, Alex holds up a mirror for her.  She let's Natalie know that where she is for her age is exactly where she's supposed to be but that more growth is still to come and that life is not about a "corner office by day, entertaining by night, and a man with a mono syllabic name who drives a four runner and only loves his golden lab more than you" (that part is abridged from the movie).

So here I am, watching this movie and further confirming that internally in a lot of ways I am a middle aged person (of either gender depending on the situation) and the movie is challenging the pressure that we 20-somethings put on ourselves to be a certain way by our 40, and the nostalgia and or regret that the 40-somethings have for not becoming the mental lists they'd made in their 20's.  Natalie is arguing with Ryan about his not wanting something serious and not wanting to see a future with someone and he asks her "Do you know that moment when you look into somebody's eyes and you can feel them staring into your soul and whole world goes quiet?"  "Yes..." she says.  And that stuck with me through out the rest of the movie, because in our lives it is those moments that all of us use to create the pressure that we are always fighting to get out from under.  We don't live in those moments when the world goes quiet, those moments happen and we immediately start to plan and see "a future" as Natalie puts it.  Someone looks into our eyes and everything else turns into a comforting hum and instead of trying to make that moment stretch, we want to take that moment and plan to have it on the 25th of the next month, so we have to take the appropriate steps to further the relationship to the 25th of the next month so that we can have that moment again and that, is bullshit. Because we don't only do it with romantic relationships and friendships, we do it with most of our expectations.  We can not let a moment be a moment and suffice to continue to do what makes us happy and have the faith that a similar moment will come again, and I think that this is not a 20s, or 30s or 40s thing, it's a people thing.  

Okay, I'm not saying that the planning is what's bullshit. You meet someone, and want to see them again then see them again, if you find the perfect apartment and need to make some moves to have it be your perfect apartment then do so.  What I'm saying is that there is a difference between making a realistic bid on that apartment or making plans for a repeat coffee date with that person, and shopping for furniture before a lease is signed or thinking about how your first name sounds with his last name just because you had a good conversation and exchanged numbers. I'm saying that the rush is bullshit, and that in rushing we're so busy being strategic and implementing this micromanaged plans that 1. we dont realize the affect it's having on our personalities before we wake up and realize that shit just isnt fun any more and 2. we wont realize the affect it's having on other people until we suddenly see that our commonalities are forced and/or we're just alone because they or we got sick of it.  And, it leaves us unappreciative of the moments that create collections that make up this life.  

Then, with that in mind, there are some of us who just try to avoid those moments, to avoid the pressure.  To avoid having pressure put on us and to avoid putting pressure on someone else.  So when Ryan Bingham puts an open backpack on a table and asks a group of people how it is possible to even attempt to survive when we are carrying all of the responsibility of relationships and attachments--with associates and co-workers, with classmates and friends, with family and spouses--on our backs, creating so much weight that we can barely move, and he suggests emptying that backpack I did not think "damn, he must be the lonliest person ever." I thought, "hm, maybe sometimes that's why I just don't answer my phone for days at a time, I'm unloading." I don't think the backpack unload should be permanent, nor do I think we're sharks as Ryan suggests but I do think there's a happy medium in which periodically, an unload is necessary, to make sure that we aren't clouding up our moments.  

And I think that that is the biggest point in the movie, to not cloud up our moments and that being up in the air or unsure is okay.  There are parts, phenomenal parts, where you see clips of person after person reacting to having lost their jobs after Ryan has fired them.  And it's sad, they're talking about their families about their expenses, and about lost time. But then, in the end (and this is not a spoiler), there is a part where the clips are coming back to back again and those same people are talking about why they wake up every morning and what is important in their lives and much of it are the same things that they were talking about when they reacted to losing their jobs.  And Ryan was connecting those two dots, whether he realized it or not, he was showing people that all of those things that were initial reactions to losing a job was clouding the moments to have with the same important things that they get up for every moment.  Is paying the bills important? Yes. Is it important to be able to take care of your family? (in my opinion) Yes.  But when we remove ourselves from the moments when we appreciate how warm and cozy our home is and the way it feels to be with our loved ones, and are so focused on just balancing the check book and keeping it balanced until next week we're clouding those moments and we're not as happy as we could be. 

I think the movie was amazing, and these are the things that it did for me. Maybe I completely misinterpret it, that's totally possible, and I'd love to hear what other people got from it.  Just of the strength of it being a well-done movie, and my personal filters to its message aside though, it should get some awards.