Reitman takes a break from satire for an old-school Hollywood romance.
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Jason Reitman is a bit of a puzzle. He's a solid visual storyteller, deft with actors, and a fine writer (the ice cream argument from THANK YOU FOR SMOKING is all his, and it's a classic). He appears to be a complete filmmaker, and yet there's a strange sense of incompleteness to most of his work. Save for the lovely JUNO, his films have a tendency to feel a little undercooked. THANK YOU FOR SMOKING, though sharp at times, ultimately played like a series of satiric vignettes, while UP IN THE AIR was a young man's approximation of middle-age anxiety. YOUNG ADULT succeeded well enough on its own terms; unfortunately, those terms were bitter, cynical and misanthropic.
Reitman has made no secret of his director-crush on Billy Wilder and Hal Ashby (he even confessed that UP IN THE AIR was "me desperately trying to make my SHAMPOO"), but he's rushing things. Though well constructed, UP IN THE AIR is more speculative than felt; his world lacks the loopy specificity of Ashby's Beverly Hills or the ineffable "touch" Wilder learned under Lubitsch. Most filmmakers would be considered arrogant or insane for aspiring to such heights, but there are at least moments in that film where you see the potential - not to be Ashby or Wilder, mind you, but Lawrence Kasdan or Paul Brickman. It just seems like Reitman likes people too much to delight in their more selfish and savage qualities.
There's not a hint of satire or cynicism in Reitman's latest
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