Down East, which banished its unwed mother and
drove her to attempted suicide, to Preston Sturges’s
irreverent 1944 comedy The Miracle of Morgan’s
Creekand its mysteriously pregnant protagonist,
Trudy Kockenlocker (whose character name alone
says a great deal about its era’s attitudes toward
women), to another mysterious, but ultimately far
more terrifying, pregnancy in Roman Polanski’s
1968 horror masterpiece Rosemary’s Baby.
Junois only one of a small stampede of recent
popular films dealing with this seemingly ever-
timely issue. A cultural analysis might compare and
contrast Junowith its American contemporaries
Knocked Up(Judd Apatow, 2007) and Waitress(Adri-
enne Shelly, 2007), both of which share Juno’s b l e n d
of comedy and drama, as well as a pronounced
ambivalence concerning abortion, but depict decid-
edly different characters, settings, and stories. What
might such an analysis of these movies (and their
critical and popular success) tell us about our own
particular era’s attitudes toward women, pregnancy,
and motherhood? Knocked Upis written and directed
by a man, Junois written by a woman and directed
by a man, Waitressis written and directed by a
woman. Does the relative gender of each film’s cre-
ator affect those attitudes? If this comparative analy-
sis incorporated Romanian filmmaker Cristian
Mungiu’s stark abortion drama 4 Months, 3 Weeks
and 2 Days(2007) or Mike Leigh’s nuanced portrayal
of the abortionist Ve r a D r a k e(2004), the result might
inform a deeper understanding of the differences
between European and American sensibilities.
An unwanted pregnancy is a potentially contro-
versial subject for any film, especially when the
central character is a teenager. Any extensive
analysis focused on Juno’s cultural meaning would
have to address what this particular film’s content
implies about the hot-button issue of abortion. By
way of illustration, let’s return to the clinic waiting
room. An analysis that asserts Junoespouses a
“pro-life” (i.e., anti-abortion) message could point
to several explicit details in this sequence and to
those preceding and following it. In contrast to the
relatively welcoming suburban settings that domi-
nate the rest of the story, the ironically named
Women Now abortion clinic is an unattractive
stone structure squatting at one end of an urban
asphalt parking lot. Juno is confronted by clearly
stated and compelling arguments against abortion
via Su-Chin’s dialogue: the “baby” has a beating
heart, can feel pain,... and has fingernails. The
clinic receptionist, the sole on-screen representa-
tive of the pro-choice alternative, is a sneering
cynic with multiple piercings and a declared taste
for fruit-flavored condoms. The idea of the fetus as
a human being, stressed by Su-Chin’s earnest
admonishments, is driven home by the scene’s for-
mal presentation analyzed earlier.
On the other hand, a counterargument maintain-
ing that Juno implies a pro-choice stance could state
that the lone on-screen representation of the pro-life
position is portrayed just as negatively (and
extremely) as the clinic receptionist. Su-Chin is pre-
sented as an infantile simpleton who wields a home-
made sign stating, rather clumsily, “No Babies Like
Murdering,” shouts “All babies want to get borned!”
and is bundled in an oversized stocking cap and pink
quilted coat as if dressed by an overprotective
mother. Juno’s choice can hardly be labeled a right-
eous conversion. Even after fleeing the clinic, the
clearly ambivalent mother-to-be struggles to ration-
alize her decision, which she announces not as “I’m
having this baby” but as “I’m staying pregnant.”
Some analysts may conclude that the filmmakers,
mindful of audience demographics, were trying to
have it both ways. Others could argue that the movie
is understandably more concerned with narrative
considerations than a precise political stance. The
negative aspects of every alternative are consistent
with a story world that offers its young protagonist
little comfort and no easy choices.Cultural and Formal Analysis in Harry Potter
The preceding discussion demonstrates that a pop-
ular mainstream entertainment like Junooffers
ample material for analysis. But are popular
movies worthy of this sort of scholarly attention?
After all, isn’t serious intellectual inquiry supposed
to be reserved for art films—the more difficult and
obscure, the better?
Although film scholars often do study unconven-
tional movies that most people have never heard of,22 CHAPTER 1LOOKING AT MOVIES