So I think I can safely say, having viewed it twice now, that Jason Reitman's Juno is the newest addition to my list of favorite movies. Okay, yes, it may be a pretty "rosy view of teen pregnancy", as my friend declared, but the humor, the characters, and the crazy dialogue ("You should've gone to China, you know, 'cause I hear they give away babies like free iPods. You know, they pretty much just put them in those t-shirt guns and shoot them out at sporting events"), as well as what I consider a pretty awesome performance by Ellen Page especially, all add up to a really enjoyable movie. Page plays Juno, a quirky, smart-ass 16-year-old who seemingly spontaneously decides to sleep with her adorable and mild-mannered best friend Bleeker (Superbad's Michael Cera), and ends up pregnant. After being freaked out at an abortion clinic by the idea that the baby has fingernails already, Juno picks a couple from an ad who are looking to adopt a child and offers to hand it over once it's born.

Doesn't sound very cute and funny, based on the premise alone, but the cast is lovable and Juno's town consists of liquor store cashiers that say "home-skillet", snug-looking houses and a high school track team hustling by at regular intervals. In gold shorts and headbands.

Juno dresses like a tomboy, has a hamburger phone, a band, a cheerleader friend who crushes on teachers, a razor sharp wit and a passion for The Stooges, yet Page gives Juno a sensitivity and sophistication that keeps the material from being too light. It's her expressions in certain moments that make those moments, like the look she gives Bleeker when she tells him she's pregnant, albeit from the armchair of a discarded living room set she has planted on his lawn. Or when Bleeker offers to get back together with her after the baby and she asks, carefully, painfully, "Were we together?"

There are many individual scenes like these that stick with you, along with the image of a mailbox full of orange-flavored tic tacs, and the twee, folky soundtrack, courtesy of The Moldy Peaches' Kimya Dawson, stays in your head for days afterwards. And let's not forget the opening track "All I Want Is You", a kids' song by Barry Louis Polisar. I had to look him up to figure out what that was all about, but it makes for a great opening sequence.

Also impressive on the acting front are Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner as the less-than-perfect adopting couple, and Allison Janney as Juno's supportive stepmom, whose line about doctors in the delivery room scene is priceless. The movie is currently showing at The Arclight in Hollywood, The Landmark on Pico, and at The Grove. Enjoy!

Image via Indiemuse