Up in the Air
Paramount Pictures | Release Date: December 4, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
83
METASCORE
Universal acclaim based on 36 Critics
Positive:
32
Mixed:
4
Negative:
0
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
100
The Hollywood ReporterStephen Farber
It's rare for a movie to be at once so biting and so moving. If Ryan's future seems bleak, there's something exhilarating about a movie made with such clear-eyed intelligence. Read full review
100
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
Up in the Air is light and dark, hilarious and tragic, romantic and real. It's everything that Hollywood has forgotten how to do; we're blessed that Jason Reitman has remembered Read full review
100
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
Up in the Air takes the trust people once had in their jobs and pulls out the rug. It is a film for this time. Read full review
100
Philadelphia InquirerCarrie Rickey
Ryan may not be admirable, but Clooney makes him relatable. It's his deepest and nakedest performance. Read full review
100
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
Up in the Air is also optimistic about the perpetual themes that preoccupy so many movies that endure the test of time: Life is better with company. And everybody needs a co-pilot. Read full review
100
San Francisco ChronicleAmy Biancolli
Crisply funny and fleetly paced, it's in its quiet way one of the saddest things in the theaters all year. Read full review
100
USA TodayClaudia Puig
Timeliness can be tricky to pull off convincingly in movies. It's tough to capture an era while it's still happening, yet Up in the Air does so brilliantly, with wit and humanity. Read full review
100
Washington PostAnn Hornaday
A smart, alert, supremely entertaining movie. Read full review
100
New York PostLou Lumenick
One of the year's best films and so tapped into the zeitgeist that it's positively scary. Read full review
100
Los Angeles TimesKenneth Turan
Up in the Air makes it look easy. Not just in its casual and apparently effortless excellence, but in its ability to blend entertainment and insight, comedy and poignancy, even drama and reality, things that are difficult by themselves but a whole lot harder in combination. This film does all that and never seems to break a sweat. Read full review
100
TimeRichard Corliss
Reitman's blend of comedy and drama, romance and social observation make Up in the Air the ideal movie --- and maybe even a cure -- for the Great Recession blues. Read full review
100
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe Williams
Up in the Air may not end up as the best picture -- that will be decided by the Academy -- but it has landed in the middle of the discussion because it's laser-focused and right on time. Read full review
100
EmpireIan Nathan
This is smart, silky, sensitive, and funny old-school movie magic. Read full review
91
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
This is a movie about, among other things, pain, and it's made by someone who understands its expression. Read full review
90
VarietyTodd McCarthy
The timing in the Clooney-Farmiga scenes is like splendid tennis, with each player surprising the other with shots but keeping the rally going to breathtaking duration. Read full review
90
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
Up in the Air is poised to be a smash, and Clooney--slim, dark, perfectly tailored--glamorizes insincerity in a way that makes you want to go out and lie. Read full review
90
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
The best of Up in the Air--meaning most of it--is right up there with the fresh and sophisticated comedies of Hollywood's golden age. Read full review
90
NewsweekDavid Ansen
There hasn't been a studio movie as unapologetically adult, sophisticated, and nuanced as Up in the Air in some time. Read full review
88
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
Reitman brings the same mixture of comedy and drama to this movie that he brought to "Juno." Read full review
88
Rolling StonePeter Travers
One-word reaction: bravo. Read full review
83
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
For much of its going, Up in the Air moves with the same refreshing pace and attitude that marked Reitman's "Thank You for Smoking" and "Juno" -- with the added frisson that the subject matter is so torn-from-the-headlines that it feels, in a good way, like reality TV. Read full review
80
The New YorkerAnthony Lane
The film is a hybrid. Its backdrop is despair, but the foreground action has the silvery zest of a comedy. Read full review
80
Dallas ObserverRobert Wilonsky
If Steven Soderbergh taught Clooney how to act in "Out of Sight," then Reitman has taught him how to stop acting. This is the most vulnerable, the most playful, the most human performance of his career. Read full review
80
The New York TimesManohla Dargis
One of the pleasures of Up in the Air is that its actresses share the frame with Mr. Clooney as equals, not props Read full review
80
New York Daily NewsElizabeth Weitzman
Perhaps it's no surprise that Reitman has come out with a lovely Hollywood romance that floats buoyantly along on a sea of sadness. Read full review
78
Austin ChronicleKimberley Jones
The middle is terrific, especially in a lengthy, unassuming scene in which the three leads sit, sip drinks, and have a good chat: It marks one of the great celluloid pleasures of the year, so virtuosically written, performed, and filmed is it. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
Farmiga has never been better than she is here. Rarely does she get to do comedy, and she and Clooney give Up in the Air's sustained air of engaging disengagement a heartbeat as well as a romantic charge. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
At its best, Up in the Air invents new realms for old Hollywood sophistication. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubKeith Phipps
What Up In The Air lacks in surprises--apart from an elusive final scene--it compensates for by conveying the pleasures of living from landing to landing, and the terror of floating away. Read full review
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
As for the implicit tragedy amidst the funny business, the swelling ranks of the unemployed, the movie has no solution but instead offers itself as implicit solace: Escape, ye wretches, into my clever humour and my nifty dialogue and my star's considerable charm. Read full review
75
PremiereMichael Mariani
A smart, brisk, but extremely thoughtful hybrid of star-vehicle and resonant depiction of right-now America. Read full review
70
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
Reitman deserves credit for going through with a bitterly ironic ending, but the movie is marred by its warm condescension toward flyover country. Read full review
50
Village VoiceJ. Hoberman
Up in the Air goes down like a sedative. This is a movie that's easy to like--and to dislike as well. Read full review
50
SlateDana Stevens
Full of clever one-liners, winning performances, and wistful indie music. It's impossible not to like it, which is precisely what's so annoying about it. Read full review
50
SalonStephanie Zacharek
Comes off not as topical but as opportunist. The picture is brushed with a fine glaze of slickness, a product sealed in a blister pack. It's like airplane air -- it has a packaged freshness that isn't really fresh at all. Read full review
40
Time OutKeith Uhlich
Reitman, who also cowrote the screenplay, feels the constant need to "deepen" his characters, granting them wants and motivations--especially during the moralistic third act--that are totally alien to how they're initially portrayed. Read full review
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