Juno (2007)

"Faced with an unplanned pregnancy, an offbeat young woman makes an unusual decision regarding her unborn child."

I'm not sure why I watched this, but I sort of liked it in a "Napoleon Dynamite" kind of way.

It's a Canadian production which is obviously based on the similarly named Korean movie "Jeni Juno". Both deal with the same subject of teenage pregnancy albeit in a slightly different way. No big points for originality here except that nobody is ever likely to watch the Korean version in the first place.

If you think that I've gone soft by reviewing a "girlie film", think again. Ellen Page was the nasty little know-it-all in "Hard Candy" (so no change here!) and there is a section in the middle where she watches a really bad horror movie with Jason Bateman and loses her argument about Argento's "Suspiria" being superior. I hate Argento too so I had a chuckle to myself about that.

Anyway, it was a quirky little film with a soundtrack comprising of those horrible "acoustic guitar and badly sung" songs which you'd find in something like "Weeds" on TV. Everything here was chosen specifically to make this an off-beat cult film for teenage girls who get knocked up everywhere. I didn't like the dialogue too much as it tended to be more than a bit ridiculous for a 16 year old to say half the things which Juno came out with. A lot of it just made me just want to kick her in her big fake pregnant belly.

I did like the overall effort and thought that went into this though even if it did rather ooze with trendy manipulation.

It's all filmed really well and it looks as if a lot more money was spent on it than was probably the case. Good production values in a low-budget independent? Well, there's a first time for everything.

It's no "Ghost World" or "Amelie" but it will certainly satisfy a gap in the niche market for the not-too-arty arthouse film lovers who are really into selfish, wise-cracking, little girls.