Juno is a well-made movie; it is modest, with a strong script, great dialogue, charming performances from charming actors and a great indie soundtrack. The movie is set in some ideal world, where love reigns and hope prevails. When the title character, a teenage girl, gets pregnant, her parents are supportive, her boyfriend waits on her and her friends rally around her. She gets a few dirty stares but the movie has no interest in the politics of teen pregnancy. It's a quiet story of a remarkable girl going through an extraordinary year.
But that hasn't kept the usual opportunists from bending this movie to their ideology. A columnist on christianpost.com states it plainly: “This indie hit provides plenty of openings for talking about values and choices and relationships.” She also writes, “Yet rather than choosing abortion for a quick and private solution to her unwanted pregnancy, Juno … chooses to take the messy situation and do what she can to redeem it.”
A regular columnist on bpnews.net notches this up a little more. He acknowledges the movie is offensive, should have an R-rating and all that, but finds in it some redeeming qualities: “Movies aimed at teens tend to focus on being hip, irreverent or borderline pornographic. Most totally ignore the subject of responsibility. I am not sure if the filmmakers intended Juno to have such a thought-provoking message … Whatever the case, the message of responsibility is present – and the majority of teens that will see Juno desperately need it.”
I don't need to tell you this columnist is an older white male – you can spot that in his condescending tone. And that authoritative voice deems the movie has “a subtle but strong pro-life message of responsibility.”
A commentator on philcooke.com adds, “Christians should have made this movie. It's interesting to note that two of the funniest (and best) movies [of 2007 were] Juno and Knocked Up. Neither were 'Christian' movies by any stretch, but both promoted (in a Hollywood style) a pro-life message. Once again, the Christian creative community has now fallen a step behind in producing content that promotes the values we stand for (as followers of Jesus) without coming off as cheesy, churchy, or irrelevant. Perhaps our picketing and right-wing political agendas aren't the best way …”
Christianity Today adds its own coda to the discussion: “Also, it is worth noting that, when all is said and done, neither Juno nor her child end up in a traditional family, as such. But in a way, that just underscores the film's implicit pro-life sensibility. Life is life, and deserves to be nurtured, even – if not especially – when everything around it is broken.”
Not to be outdone, pro-choicers are claiming Juno for their side: A columnist for Slate.com puts it this way: “[Juno] isn't moved by thoughts of the embryo's hallowed rights, however, but by a sense of her own autonomy. And for her, that doesn't mean a right to privacy, or to protect her body (“a fat suit I can't take off,” she calls it at one point). Juno is driven by the chance to make her own unconventional choice. [Her parents] emerge as people who respect, and would do anything to support, their independent-minded kid.”
So, how can the same movie be two opposite things at the same time? Well, it can't really – but, it's charm and success give wags permission to grind their own axes. And, this is the nature of our modern-day rhetoric: it's all about the message track. The truth – whatever that might be – is not as important as the spin. And that's all this is: its spin. But, it's not spin to promote the movie; on the contrary, it's spin that uses the movie to promote one's own ideology.
So, the last word here should come from those closest to Juno's age. They can be found on christianteenforums.com. Two comments leapt out at me: “I thought it was a cute movie. It was good overall except for the promoting teen pregnancy thing.”
And – to prove that moral choices are complicated: “I hated it. Good thing I downloaded it, 'cause it would have sucked to actually have to pay to see that.”
