Juno Jason Reitman

Box office performance

In limited release and playing in only seven theaters in Los Angeles and New York City, Juno grossed $420,113 over its debut weekend, averaging $60,016 per screen.[71] When Juno became Fox Searchlight's first film to surpass $100 million at the box office, the company's president Peter Rice issued the statement: "This is an astonishing feat for us and the film has surpassed all our expectations. We knew this film had crossover potential and it has resonated with audiences all across the country."[78] The film has grossed $143,495,265 in the United States and $88,877,416 in other territories for a total worldwide gross of $232,372,681.[4] It was also the highest-grossing of the five Best Picture nominees for the 80th Academy Awards.[79]

Critical reaction

Juno received highly positive reviews from critics. On the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film has a 94% approval rating from critics based on 217 reviews, with an average rating of 8.10/10. The site's consensus states, "One of the brightest, funniest comedies of the year, Juno's smart script and direction are matched by assured performances in a coming of age story with a 21st century twist."[80] making it the best reviewed comedy film on the website in 2007.[81] On Metacritic, the film had an average score of 81 out of 100, based on 38 reviews.[82] Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film four stars and called it "just about the best movie of the year. ... Has there been a better performance this year than [Elliot] Page's creation of Juno? I don't think so."[83] Ebert placed Juno at number one on his annual "best of" list. The film also ranks at number 463 in Empire magazine's 2008 list of The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time.[84] Juno MacGuff also ranked number 56 on Empire's list of The 100 Greatest Movie Characters of All Time.[85] Paste Magazine named it one of the 50 Best Movies of the Decade (2000–2009), ranking it at number 15.[86] In June 2010, Entertainment Weekly named Juno one of the 100 Greatest Characters of the Last 20 Years.[87]

However, not all critics share the positive view towards Juno. David Edelstein of New York magazine felt that the film was desperate to be "a movie that confers hipness on teens, that makes kids want to use the same slang and snap up the soundtrack".[88] Music reviewer Jim DeRogatis criticized the film's stylized dialogue and what he saw as a casual take on abortion and Juno's naïveté in becoming pregnant, claiming: "As an unapologetically old-school feminist, the father of a soon-to-be-teenage daughter, a reporter who regularly talks to actual teens as part of his beat and a plain old moviegoer, I hated, hated, hated this movie."[89]

"The Juno Effect"

In 2008, after 17 students under sixteen years of age at Gloucester High School in Massachusetts became pregnant, Time magazine called it the "Juno Effect".[90] Time stated that some adults dismissed the statistic as an outlier while others accused films such as Juno and Knocked Up for glamorizing teenage pregnancy. Kristelle Miller, an Adolescent Psychology Professor at University of Minnesota-Duluth stated that "[t]he 'Juno effect' is how media glamorizes pregnancy and how [...] pregnancy is also redemptive of any past problems".[91]

After Senator John McCain named Alaska Governor Sarah Palin as his running mate on the Republican presidential ticket, it was revealed in September 2008 that Gov. Palin's daughter, Bristol, age 17, was pregnant with the child of another teenager. News reports and editorials termed Bristol Palin's pregnancy as the latest episode in the debate over teen pregnancy of which Juno was a part,[92][93] while conservative commentators made comparisons between Bristol Palin's pregnancy and the film.[94][95] Noted New Republic literary editor Leon Wieseltier, "The Republicans wanted a new conversation, and they got one. Juno in Juneau!"[94] Fox News' Roger Friedman wondered, "Juno at once violated and vindicated conservative values. The question is, will the public rally 'round Bristol Palin the way it did Juno? Or will it reject her for getting in this situation in the first place?"[95]

Juno actor Jason Bateman defended the film. "Unfortunately," he said, "we've had these instances where guys kill people because of what they hear in rock 'n roll lyrics or some garbage like that. Look, if you're going to blame a movie or song for your actions, whether they be good or bad, I think you're looking at the wrong things to influence your life. I think people should look to other areas of their life for lessons and guidance, mainly parents, or teachers, or friends, or whomever. That should probably be where you should point your eyes and ears."[96]

Amy Benfer of Salon.com wrote in 2010 that, according to figures released by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, pregnancy rates for all teenagers dropped 2 percent between 2007 and 2008, meaning that "the slight uptick in teen pregnancy rates between 2005 and 2006 were probably just an anomaly and not some heinous trend brought about by pop culture", and that if there had been such a thing as a "Juno effect", it would have caused pregnancies to go down, not up. She criticized proponents of the theory, stating that they believed that teenagers "somehow lose all ability to evaluate any nuance or context in that woman's particular situation, and instead make some sort of primitive cause-and-effect connection" and that "by talking about pregnant girls, and most of all, by daring to portray some of them as ordinary, even likable, we'd get way more babies having babies." She concluded that "depicting teen parents may not glamorize them, so much as humanize them. You know, that thing that happens when one person recognizes that someone else is a person too? So, now that we can firmly state that realistically depicting the lives of the tiny percentage of girls who do become pregnant won't necessarily contaminate the rest of them, it's time to stop worrying and ask what we can do to help."[97]

In light of Georgia's anti-abortion law, Diablo Cody said in 2019 she would not have written Juno now that people perceive it as an "anti-choice" film.[98] In 2022, she said, "Back in 2008, I got a letter from some administrator at my Catholic high school thanking me for writing a movie that was in line with the school’s values. And I was like: 'What have I done?' My objective as an artist is to be a traitor to that culture, not to uplift it," but also, "I have no regrets about writing the movie. I do think it’s important that I continue to clarify my feelings about it because the last thing I would ever want is for someone to interpret the movie as anti-choice. That is a huge paranoia of mine. I’ve never really thought about revisiting the film — it kind of feels like something that should stay preserved in amber. But I would rather have this account be out there than [my] silence being misinterpreted".[99]

Top ten lists

The film appeared on critics' top ten lists of the best films of 2007:

Accolades

Reitman expressed disappointment that Juno was ruled ineligible for the Genie Award nominations:

It's a Canadian director, Canadian stars, Canadian cast, Canadian crew, shot in Canada—how are we not eligible for a Genie when David Cronenberg's film [Eastern Promises] about Russians living in London shot in England with a British crew and British cast is eligible? I'm sorry, but somebody is going to have to explain that to me.[109]

Sara Morton, the head of the Academy of Canadian Cinema and Television, issued a statement explaining that the film had never been submitted for Genie Award consideration by its studio.[110] The Hollywood Reporter explained that Genie rules define Canadian films as financed at least in part by Canadian sources, and because American companies Mandate Pictures and Fox Searchlight were the sole funders, Juno was ineligible.[110] Nonetheless, Genie spokesman Chris McDowall said that while the film was not evaluated for eligibility since it was not submitted, "Financing is one of the criteria, but it's not everything."[110] Despite this, the film was eligible for the 2008 Canadian Comedy Awards, receiving two wins from three nominations.[111][112]