Juno 2007

Michael Phillips, Chicago Tribune: It takes Juno about 15 minutes to calm down and get its joke reflex in check. ... And by the end you've fallen in love with the thing. Read more

Moira MacDonald, Seattle Times: By its end, Juno, in its guilelessly chatty way, touches the heart -- and yes, I had tears in my eyes. This movie works, on its own terms. Read more

David Edelstein, New York Magazine/Vulture: Prepare yourself for the Juno generation. Read more

J. R. Jones, Chicago Reader: The movie is distinctive for its complicated emotions. Read more

Scott Tobias, AV Club: Strikingly written by newcomer Diablo Cody, Juno will get a lot of attention for its colorful dialogue, which is at times too ostentatious for its own good, but the film's sincerity is what ultimately carries it across. Read more

Bill Goodykoontz, Arizona Republic: Once [Page] - and her character - move beyond the too-cool-for-school act, Juno becomes something special, and memorable. Read more

Ty Burr, Boston Globe: That smart, hip, human comedy you've been waiting for all year? The one with dialogue like a sugar rush and performances like grace notes? It's called Juno and it just arrived in theaters. Go forth and multiplex. Read more

Carina Chocano, Los Angeles Times: Juno is hilarious and sweet-tempered, perceptive and surprisingly grounded. It's also a gust of fresh air, perspective-wise. Read more

Peter Rainer, Christian Science Monitor: Juno, the second feature directed by Jason Reitman, is far from great but it has qualities of feeling that lift it far above the ordinary. Read more

Lisa Kennedy, Denver Post: Juno is unerring, compassionate and funny as heck. Read more

Tom Long, Detroit News: Juno is the best movie of the year. It's the best screenplay of the year, and it features the best actress of the year working with the best acting ensemble of the year. Read more

Lisa Schwarzbaum, Entertainment Weekly: A blithe charmer balanced somewhere between a life-should-be-so-neat fairy tale and a life's-a-real-bitch tragicomedy. Read more

Amy Nicholson, I.E. Weekly: Juno may look like Knocked Up's kid sister, but it bests it on all fronts from jokes to emotional insight. Read more

Ella Taylor, L.A. Weekly: Tart of tongue and sweet of disposition, Juno offers living proof that crisp writing, graceful directing and an abundantly poised young lead can perk up a premise that's been bludgeoned to death. Read more

John Anderson, Newsday: A movie already reputed to be hipper than tomorrow night, Jason Reitman's follow-up to Thank You for Smoking is actually sweet, romantic and irony-free. Read more

David Denby, New Yorker: Juno is a coming-of-age movie made with idiosyncratic charm and not a single false note. Read more

Bob Mondello, NPR.org: Screenwriter Diablo Cody and director Jason Reitman make Juno the marvelously un-still center of a wistfully acerbic comedy that qualifies as a feminized version of Knocked Up. Read more

Jack Mathews, New York Daily News: It is certainly the feel-good movie of the season, and credit for that goes to the gifted [director] Reitman, novice screenwriter Diablo Cody and the film's sensational lead actress, Ellen Page. Read more

Lou Lumenick, New York Post: Hollywood's Woman of the Year is a pregnant 16-year-old, the incredibly hip, smart-mouthed and totally endearing heroine of the wise and witty Juno. Read more

Rex Reed, New York Observer: The snappy, new wave dialogue and a sprightly cast that considers suburban insanity as normal as an addiction to nasal spray and one-calorie breath mints turns Juno into an incendiary comic spree. Read more

Andrew Sarris, New York Observer: Juno represents an almost magical configuration of very talented people with very much the same brand of whipsaw humor. Read more

Carrie Rickey, Philadelphia Inquirer: What kind of movie is Juno? The rarity that plucks your heartstrings while tickling them. Read more

James Berardinelli, ReelViews: Juno, directed by Jason Reitman, is smart, witty, and engaging -- three ingredients that, when applied to any film, comprise a recipe for success. Read more

Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times: A fresh, quirky, unusually intelligent comedy about a 16-year-old girl who wins our hearts in the first scene. Read more

Stephanie Zacharek, Salon.com: This is an indie crowd pleaser that's much more enjoyable -- in other words, not nearly as horrifying -- as Little Miss Sunshine. Read more

David Wiegand, San Francisco Chronicle: Juno isn't a film made in the bell jar of unlikely reality that is, far too often, Hollywood: It's a film whose attention to real-life detail is so fine, audiences will be hopelessly and happily lost in its story from the first frame. Read more

Dana Stevens, Slate: With a charismatic lead performance from Page and a plaintive score of indie-rock songs, Juno seems poised to be the season's youth-culture hit. Read more

Colin Covert, Minneapolis Star Tribune: Juno invites you into a world you won't want to leave. Read more

Liam Lacey, Globe and Mail: The film's forced quirkiness constantly threatens to derail the entire enterprise. But it keeps being put back on track by the apparently effortless performance of a great young actress. Read more

Peter Howell, Toronto Star: The best thing about this movie is that for all its wiseacre badinage, it's utterly believable about the most basic of human situations. Read more

Richard Schickel, TIME Magazine: Juno is not a great movie; it does not have aspirations in that direction. But it is, in its little way, a truthful, engaging and welcome entertainment. Read more

Hank Sartin, Time Out: Read more

Melissa Anderson, Time Out: Read more

Christopher Orr, The New Republic: Fierce without being cruel, sweet without becoming saccharine, and never short of hilarious, it's not only the best comedy of the year, but one of the best films, period. Read more

Claudia Puig, USA Today: The engaging story, coupled with the character's likable quirkiness, makes for a film bristling with vitality and heart, without resorting to glibness or sentimentality. Read more

Todd McCarthy, Variety: Dialogue and pic overall are saved from cloying glibness by the fact that Juno is not only a smarty-pants, but also genuinely smart and self-possessed, even if her condition occasionally threatens her composure. Read more

Robert Wilonsky, Village Voice: By the end, it's unexpectedly moving without ever once trolling for crocodile tears. It's a sneak attack. Read more

Desson Thomson, Washington Post: It transcends its own genre. Only superficially a teen comedy, the movie redounds with postmodern -- but emotionally genuine -- gravitas. Read more