December 13, 2009 | permalink
I’ve been telling anyone who will listen that Up in the Air is a lock for Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Actor (for George Clooney, of course), and a strong contender for Best Picture, Best Supporting Actress (Vera Farmiga) and maybe Best Director (Jason Reitman).
The reason? It isn’t a film about about emotionally unavailable frequent flyers, but the way we live now in post-recessionary America, just as Crash was about the way we live now in post-racial (but not really) America. Don’t take my word for it; The New York Times’ Frank Rich has reached the same conclusion:
“Here is an America whose battered inhabitants realize that the economic deck is stacked against them, gamed by distant, powerful figures they can’t see or know. “Up in the Air” may be a glossy production sprinkled with laughter and sex, but it captures the distinctive topography of our Great Recession as vividly as a far more dour Hollywood product of 70 years ago, “The Grapes of Wrath,” did the vastly different landscape of the Great Depression.”
» Folllow me on Twitter.
» Email me.
» See upcoming events.
Greg Lindsay is a generalist, urbanist, futurist, and speaker. He is a 2022-2023 urban tech fellow at Cornell Tech’s Jacobs Institute, where he leads The Metaverse Metropolis — a new initiative exploring the implications of augmented reality at urban scale. He is also a senior fellow of MIT’s Future Urban Collectives Lab, a senior advisor to Climate Alpha, and a non-resident senior fellow of the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Strategy Initiative.
August 05, 2023
FT: Self-Created Communities for the Digital Age
August 03, 2023
Microtargeting Unmasked: A Threatcasting Report
August 01, 2023
At What Point Managed Retreat?
July 18, 2023
Prepare for Descent: The Relative Decline of the US Passport
----- | August 3, 2023
----- | July 1, 2023
CityLab | June 12, 2023
Augmented Reality Is Coming for Cities
CityLab | April 25, 2023
The Line Is Blurring Between Remote Workers and Tourists
CityLab | December 7, 2021
The Dark Side of 15-Minute Grocery Delivery
Fast Company | June 2021
Why the Great Lakes need to be the center of our climate strategy
Fast Company | March 2020
How to design a smart city that’s built on empowerment–not corporate surveillance
URBAN-X | December 2019
CityLab | December 10, 2018
The State of Play: Connected Mobility in San Francisco, Boston, and Detroit
Harvard Business Review | September 24, 2018
Why Companies Are Creating Their Own Coworking Spaces
CityLab | July 2018
The State of Play: Connected Mobility + U.S. Cities
Medium | May 1, 2017
Fast Company | January 19, 2017
The Collaboration Software That’s Rejuvenating The Young Global Leaders Of Davos
The Guardian | January 13, 2017
What If Uber Kills Public Transport Instead of Cars
Backchannel | January 4, 2017
The Office of the Future Is… an Office
New Cities Foundation | October 2016
Now Arriving: A Connected Mobility Roadmap for Public Transport
Inc. | October 2016
Why Every Business Should Start in a Co-Working Space
Popular Mechanics | May 11, 2016
Can the World’s Worst Traffic Problem Be Solved?
The New Republic | January/February 2016
Fast Company | September 22, 2015
We Spent Two Weeks Wearing Employee Trackers: Here’s What We Learned