Cindy
Crain
ENG
102
Laura
Cline
20
April 2012
Time,
Balance, Fulfillment (and Cardboard Cutouts)
The horrific events of 9-11 and the economic
downturn that followed in the United States have created a return to a more
holistic lifestyle. As people lose their
high paying jobs, they turn to other things for evidence of their self
worth. The book Up in the Air, published in 2001 during positive economic times,
illustrated the lack of humanity and the disconnection between Ryan Bingham and
other characters; whereas the movie, released in 2009 amidst a punishing
economic climate, emphasized the connections.
The heart of the movie was about
family and intimate relationships. The
interviews at the end of the movie that showed people talking about how their
family or friends got them through the crisis of job loss reflect the change in
our society. When they lost their jobs,
their focus shifted from their professional life to their life in its
entirety. What people focus on is what
their lives become; so hyper focusing on a specific financial or numeric goal,
as Ryan Bingham did with his million miles in the book, creates a status-based
outlook, whereas having the spotlight on personal development creates a more
holistic outlook with finances being a part of the balance but not the focal
point.
In the book, Ryan is so focused on the
million mile mark that he neglects other things in his life such as family,
friends and health. His family takes the
backseat to his quest, such as when he is so wrapped up in a phone conversation
regarding his miles that his sister finally leaves the car and starts walking down
the highway in the other direction and he doesn’t hang up right away, but
continues talking to Linda about his possible lost miles: “Julie is tiny now. Is that her thumb out? We’re past the speck point, into the
unknown. This will go down as the time I
cast her off in northern Colorado or southern Wyoming and will pass to Kara as
part of her moral arsenal” (Kirn 239). This
is in contrast with the movie, when Ryan takes the cutout of his sister and her
fiancé to different places as he travels and takes photos of it. In the book this would have been out of
character. Not only would he have
considered himself too busy for the project, but with the drug activity he
engaged in plus the memory difficulties he was having, he would not have been
able to keep track of the cardboard cutout.
In the book everything but his goal was simply considered unnecessary
distraction. This is indicative of the
times; in 2001 the pursuit of personal status was a socially acceptable
pastime, in 2009 focusing solely on a status-driven goal had come to be viewed
as slightly pathetic.
The movie included more personal
interaction between Ryan and other characters, and he got involved in a close
relationship with Alex. Because he was
living in the post 9-11 world, he was able to show a higher level of
sensitivity. This close interaction was
neglected in the book, and in fact Ryan didn’t express any real desire to have
interpersonal relationships or create connections. The closest he gets is with Alex, when he
notes, “The rest was all a bonus. And I
may just have met my soul mate tonight, though I’m still not sure which one she
was” (Kirn 324). In the movie Ryan
mentored a young, green coworker – true, not by choice – but he stepped up and
did it, and displayed compassion and some tenderness toward her. As many men who have lost their jobs have
been thrust into the position of caretaker while their wives are in some cases
still employed, men are gaining empathy.
The social definition of what it means to be a man has shifted as men’s
roles have become more ambiguous. Men
are freer to express understanding and are in fact encouraged to do so as they
are caring for their young children or dealing with teenage angst.
In contrast, in the book Ryan was
completely goal-oriented to the exclusion of all else. The quest for miles became his life, so much so that when Linda, one of the women he
sees, calls it a symbol, he thinks, “I’m disappointed to hear her put it this
way. It’s insensitive and
inaccurate. She demeans me. The Nike ‘swoosh’ is a symbol. This isn’t that. This is life, this thing, and this is me, and
this woman who claims to care for me should understand” (Kirn 235). Ryan was able to focus solely on his mileage goal
because no more was expected of him; it was accepted as the norm during that
time period, but men being portrayed in 2009 needed to have a broader focus in
their lives in order to be believable characters. Those without families were not exempt from
this emerging social distinction; they had different options, but the societal
mandate was clear: You are not your job.
Become more.
This is not to say that women did not
bump up against this same mandate, but the majority of women were already
juggling more and for them a shift was required, but not a complete
overhaul. In addition, more men than
women were influenced by the recession.
The New York Times defined one of the buzzwords of 2009 as, “mancession
– a recession that affects men more than women.
Also hecession” (Leibovich/Barrett 3).
When a man’s identity is tied up in his job, and he loses that job and
has difficulty finding another, his life requires restructuring. Some of the words being tossed around in the
years leading up to 2009 were life
balance and personal fulfillment,
as men who were accustomed to working each day began to find other ways to
enrich their lives. Men’s magazines
contained advice on how to achieve balance and women’s magazines overflowed
with articles on how women could help the men in their lives retain their
dignity and create new ways of looking at themselves. Suddenly, due to social pressure, even men who
hadn’t lost their jobs were thrust into this other way of being.
In the period between 2001 and 2009 a wealth
of books about health and wellness flew off the shelves, and books on men’s health
were suddenly more prolific. Women have been
notoriously interested in wellness, weight loss and the total body, but now books
were popping up with titles like The Men’s
Health Longevity Program: A 12-week Plan to Bolster Your Health, Get Lean, Boost
Your Brainpower, Power Up, Feel Great Now and Later, Keep the Sex Hot, with
chapters titled: “Eat to AgeProof Your Body” (Goldberg 285), and, “Acknowledge a
Higher Force” (Goldberg 374). The self-help
genre was certainly available to men prior to this time in history, but focused
more on management style and work habits. Suddenly authors had a whole new target market,
men – many without jobs – who were becoming more interested in their personal development
and overall wellness. The screenwriters of
Up in the Air had to acknowledge these
societal shifts in order for the movie to be successful.
Releasing the movie in 2009 as the book
was written in 2001 would have meant that Ryan, as the main character, was not
authentic at the time of release. The
events of 9-11, as well as the significant financial slump between 2001 and
2009, changed the United States as an entity and each individual living within
its borders, so much so that something written months before was out of date,
let alone eight years prior. Adjustments
had to be made in order to compensate for the social shifts that occur when
major events transpire. In order for
Ryan to be a believable character he had to lose a bit of his focus on the
status of mileage and take on more sensitivity and empathy; otherwise he would
have appeared no more realistic than the cardboard cutouts of his sister and
her fiancé, simply posing as someone having a life.
Works Cited
Kirn, Walter. Up in the Air: A
Novel. Anchor Books, 2009. Print.
Leibovich, Mark and Barrett,
Grant. "Buzzwords:
Coining a Not Great Year." The
New York Times 20
Dec 2009: late ed.: WK03. Print.
Goldgerg, Kenneth A. The Men’s Health Longevity Program: A 12-week
Plan to Bolster Your Health, Get Lean,
Boost Your Brainpower, Power Up, Feel Great Now and Later, Keep the Sex Hot. St. Martins Press, 2005.
Print.
