Pregnancy’s been big at the theater this year. First Waitress, then Knocked Up and now Juno. Believe the hype — this one’s as good as you’ve heard.

Ellen Page (Hard Candy), who makes both critics and audiences foam at the mouth whenever she stars in a new movie, plays Juno MacGuff, a 16-year-old, high school junior who discovers she is pregnant after a one-night stand with mild-mannered best-friend and lovable nerd, Paulie Bleeker (Superbad’s Michael Cera). She doesn’t want the baby but she doesn’t want an abortion either. Instead, she and her best friend, Leah (Olivia Thirlby) scour a local newspaper and discover a couple interested in adopting. By the time she breaks the news to her way-cool father and stepmother (J.K. Simons and Allison Janney), she’s got everything worked out.

Mark and Vanessa Loring (Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner) are the picture perfect couple. They and their taupe McMansion come straight from a high-end catalogue, glossy and immaculate. Everything is in place, fastidiously managed, nothing colored outside the lines. Mark once had dreams of being a rock-and-roll musician, but now stashes that dream, along with his personality and unkempt past, in the single room his wife “allows just for him.” Decked in power suits and pearls, Vanessa is a successful businesswoman who also desperately, frantically wants to be a mother. For his part, Mark isn’t even sure their perfectly manicured marriage is worth keeping, let alone a baby.

Young Juno is utterly self-possessed and breathlessly self-aware, the sort of person who is infinitely comfortable in any situation simply because she is infinitely comfortable in her own skin. Blessed with an acerbic wit, Juno treats her pregnancy the way she would any other aspect of her life — with the same flippant, miles beyond hip, too-cool-for-school sarcasm she always employs.

But her sardonic mouth is light years ahead of her understanding. It isn’t that she’s dim-witted or even hypocritical. Far from it. She is just painfully, awkwardly young and no matter how much she protests this fact throughout the film, only experience will bring her closer to wisdom. It’s a safe bet that after this coming-of-age episode, a healthy dose of wisdom is on the way.

Diablo Cody, the one-time stripper and first-time screenwriter behind Juno is obviously channeling herself by the truckload. Her words are bitingly droll, tactless yet tender, and infinitely quotable. Her characters never veer anywhere near stereotypes, possessed of so many dimensions that you may think you need some of those fancy glasses just to see them all.

So much for a sophomore slump from director Jason “son of Ivan” Reitman. After giving us the hilarious and stinging 2006 satire Thank You For Smoking, Reitman’s second feature film manages to be both funnier and more endearing. He has crafted a movie as playful as it is tender, as eccentric as it is truthful, as hilarious as it is heartwarming.

© Copyright 2007 Brandon Fibbs. All rights reserved.