Juno (2007)

Document Type

Miscellaneous

Publication Date

5-2017

Abstract

Juno is a hilariously fascinating movie that demonstrates the life of a pregnant teenager. With my wife currently being pregnant, I can attest that pregnancy is hard enough without the added stress of high school, parents, no money, and no job. It is hard to see how anyone could go through all of that at the same time. Jason Reitman, the director of Juno, is able to open up this complex world of a young woman and show the difficulties related to teenage pregnancy. With such an eye opening movie, however, there is almost always a larger effect on the mind of the viewers that oftentimes leads to controversy.

In the case of Juno, the biggest controversy is known as the Juno Effect. The Juno Effect is a phenomenon that critics claim happened after Juno was released in 2007. The claim is that pop culture influences young minds into acting outside the boundaries of the norm and behaving as they see in the movies. Many of these critics also claim that Juno is Reitman’s way of glorifying teen pregnancy and showing it’s not as bad as it may initially seem. I disagree with the claim that the Juno Effect exists. Instead, I argue that Reitman is not glorifying teen pregnancy and created Juno to allow viewers the chance to understand why teens make the decisions they do. My claim also debunks the idea that teens make choices based on pop culture. By showing onscreen how teens go through decision-making processes, it becomes clear that Reitman believes pop culture is not the main influence of their decisions and is actually the relationships they hold with family and peers. After comparing the cinematic techniques with the views of other analysts as well as government generated statistics, it becomes clear that the Juno Effect has become a scapegoat and is not a main cause of the choices that teens make.

Link to Full Text

Share

COinS