'Up in the Air', a Funny, Thought-provoking Look at Corporate, Computerized Life

In Jason Reitman's Up in the Air, the plight of human interaction in the computer age is the main thematic focus. The main character, Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) is almost a computer himself - a charming, attractive computer, but nevertheless, he is a man who behaves with computer-like precision and focus. Messy emotions, personal relationships, and his own real desires are locked away, and in their places he puts an emphasis on rational, purposeful actions, meaningless sexual encounters, and an overarching denial so big, not even a movie about him can actually reveal the specific roots of his malaise.

This is a moody picture. It is subtle, too, with a number of examples where images are allowed to speak instead of the endless chatter that infects many films of this ilk. Ryan is rootless and lost, and yet he gives the impression of someone who is always in control. (Isn't that always the way?) You see, he is all about business. And for him, that business is all about destroying a person's sense of security. He works for a firm that is hired to do the dirty work of laying people off when their cowardly corporate bosses can't stomach it. For Ryan, the job is perfect. For one thing, it actually requires someone to avoid personal connections with anyone. but more importantly, it enables him to justify his rootlessness because so much travel is involved. One day he's in St. Louis, the next he's in Dallas. It becomes like a game to him. As he tells a coworker, he is collecting air miles, not so he can use them for some fabulous Tahitian holiday, but just so he can reach the 10 million mile mark and receive the Concierge Key - an honor that includes a private meeting with an executive pilot. he collects miles because there is nothing else in his life. He flies constantly, not only for his job, but because he has nowhere to land. He is spiritually homeless.

The plot has one of Ryan's co-workers, Natalie (Anna Kendrick), a young crackerjack fresh out of business school, inventing an Internet-based videoconferencing system to allow mass firings to occur remotely without the need for (and expense of) constant travel - the very thing Ryan cherishes most about his job. This computer-based process is the villain and Ryan strenuously argues that there needs to be one-on-one interaction in matters of this personal significance. This is a major concern of the plot. But also, the film repeatedly brings up the idea of loyalty. It is this other, more abstract idea that is the more compelling one. While our hero racks up air miles and belongs to nearly every loyalty membership club possible (as we learn from a scene reminiscent of Fight Club, where he compares memberships with a female companion), he spends his life working for disloyal entities - companies who dismiss employees in a cost-cutting frenzy without regard to the value of their years of service. And with this new "innovation," his own boss' loyalty is questioned.

Reitman, who co-wrote the film with Sheldon Turner and others, also wrote Thank You For Smoking, another anti-corporate film that joins humor with a message every "little guy" can embrace. Up in the Air is very funny at times, but it also disrupts our complacency a bit. In its focus on the problem of unemployment, to which many people can personally relate in these economic times, and in its distrust of both corporate culture and computer automation, the film feels very timely. In some ways it is a cautionary tale about the depersonalization that takes place when computers are made to take control of every single aspect of human interaction. But it is also a contemplation of what we choose to do with our lives and how our own choices impact other people and society as a whole.

Up in the Air is surprisingly introspective. But at the same time, it clearly seeks to connect with its largely American audience via various sequences in which ordinary people respond to being fired - some angry, some frightened, some even suicidal. The corporate powers that be are barely mentioned and never seen in the film. It's all by design, of course. They are represented by Ryan, but the emptiness he begins to feel changes him so that while he may represent them in terms of his job function, spiritually, he becomes quite distant from them and closer to us. Perhaps the people who have this actual job as downsizers feel an emptiness, a lack of meaningful existence, a need to disconnect from their own humanity - at least while doing their job. But it's hard to imagine the real corporate culprits who fly around in their private jets and collect houses the way Ryan collects air miles. They are like phantoms, felt but never seen.

Up in the Air opens in limited release on December 4th and goes wide on December 25th. It is rated R and runs 109 minutes.