There are no rivers of Juno-hate. Stu Van Airsdale‘s rant aside, there never has been. There is only a sense of Juno proportion, which is where I’ve been coming from all along. Take shots but don’t throw grenades because it’s a good film about perk and snark and emotional conviction. It’s smart, appealing, likable. Just not Oscar-winning. And that’s not a putdown. Fox Searchlight is delighted with how it’s performed and been received. It’s all to the good. Count the money.
Update: Van Airsdale just wrote to say he’s being “misrepresent[ed]” as a Juno hater. “Read my rant again,” he writes. “We’re saying the same thing. I like the movie fine, I just want to keep its box-office and feel-good creds separate from its Oscar creds. If one is synonymous with the other, then maybe the bigger issue is not *what* the Academy recognizes as its ‘Best Picture’, but rather how it defines such. For people who care about the institution and its history — let alone the industry that banks on its imprimatur — it’s not an irrelevant matter.”