Up in the Air, director Jason Reitman’s third feature film, is a moving coming-of-middle-age piece that is a beat for beat redux of the director’s Thank You for Smoking. This film would feel stale if it weren’t so damn refreshing. Searing wit and heart-rending reveals are just two reasons to see this film. George Clooney is another, and in a big way.

Tossed around as sex-symbol, superhero, goofball and playmate, Clooney steps up to the plate in this film to portray Ryan Bingham, a jet setting consultant whose sole purpose is to fire people at companies across the country. A frequent traveler, Bingham has bought into everything we always thought was so cool about flying. The compactness, the anonymity, the human ingenuity. Where most people cringe, he feels at home; and at home, he there are no traces of an existence. Only someone of Clooney’ charisma could make a vagabond look so put together. Read on…