Anna Kendrick as Natalie Keener in Up in the Air
George Clooney was great in Up in the Air. Did you expect anything less? So was Vera Farmiga– thank God she’s found a role more exciting than the one in The Departed. But what I want to talk about today is Natalie Keener, played by the lovely and talented Anna Kendrick. (Spoilers follow.)
Much as I enjoyed the Ryan Bingham parts of the film, I was completely blown away by the character of Natalie Keener. I’m constantly complaining to anyone who’ll listen that women in film tend to be underwritten in general. In the particular case of working women, Hollywood loves to create a false dichotomy between a nurturing or “feminine” personality and professional competence. (Think Devil Wears Prada, 13 Going on 30, How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days, anything with Sandra Bullock.) Only at the end of the movie, once she’s figured out there’s more to life than her BlackBerry, can she live a full, happy life with the man she never realized she needed.
But Natalie Keener is the exception to the rule. She’s multi-facted, even contradictory, in the way people are in real life but are rarely allowed to be in film. She’s the ambitious rising star of her company, but she’s also a romantic and an idealist. She’s intelligent and caring, but still naive enough to think that firing people over the Internet is a good idea. Natalie does not ultimately soften herself up so that she can achieve her dream to get married and have kids. At the end of the movie we see she’s only moved ahead in her career, wiser than ever and no less ambitious. Interestingly, however, we’re never promised that Natalie (or any woman) can in fact have it all– only that she’s going to keep trying.
So the role itself is well written, but Kendrick really sells the hell out of it. She imbues Natalie with such a strong sense of personality that it never once strikes us as contradictory that this woman could be both a soft-hearted romantic and an efficient firing machine. Even when she sobs hysterically in the middle of a hotel lobby, it seems less like the same ol’ female troubles we’ve seen before and more like a natural reaction from someone who’s just been dumped. Perhaps most importantly, Kendrick never tries too hard to make Natalie likable– Natalie is who she is because she can’t help it, not because Kendrick feels compelled to charm audiences. Natalie’s sweet, but she’s also full of flaws, and not the quirky-cute kind that Hollywood likes to sell us.
I’m not exaggerating when I say that Natalie Keener is one of the few times I’ve seen a female character onscreen in whom I could recognize myself and my friends. Young women in the movies are stereotyped in several different ways, but in truth the ones I know are both romantic and ruthless, hardworking and fun. Just like Natalie Keener.
Tags: 2009, anna kendrick, feminism, movies, up in the air
