Juno: A Myth

Juno: A Myth

Juno is a movie about a quirky but beautiful sixteen year old girl in high school. She ends up getting pregnant and feels that she needs to get an abortion so that she can get rid of this problem. When she goes to the abortion clinic she is unable to go through with the procedure because she has learned that her baby already has humanistic body parts. She decides to keep the baby and put it up for adoption. When she finds the perfect family to adopt the baby she finds out that they are having marital problems. Vanessa, the wife, decides that she still wants the baby even without her husband. After Juno has given birth to the baby she gets back together with the father of the baby.

This film is very alarming to me, as a viewer, because it creates illusions for teens about pregnancy that are not true. This movie is creating a myth that once the baby is gone life goes on just like a fairy tale. What about the emotional strain that this girl is going to live with? What if ten years from then she thinks she made the wrong decision? It scared me that the message in this film to teenagers was: its okay to get pregnant, you’re just a birthing vessel and after that, life will be the same way it was before! It does teens a great disservice to put this theory in their head and it is all part of the secret education that movies create.

One movie, such as Juno, could greatly influence how teenagers of all ages think about pregnancy and adoption. Thomas Hine describes in The Rise and Fall of the American Teenager how one small incident can have huge effects on a society and because of the media, twist views. In his article a young woman gives birth on prom night, in the bathroom, and then kills her baby. “By giving birth to and killing her baby at the senior prom, the young woman provided neighbors and pundits with a very strong temptation to cast what happened as a parable. (13)” In Juno we see her at the end of the movie singing a song with her boyfriend and even kissing him. It seemed like a perfect day in a perfect life! This poor girl just gave up a baby which normally would have long term emotional effects. The fact that they show her happy and with a man would allow teens to think that this process of birthing and adoption is like a walk in the park.

Another example of this is that Juno and her baby are both white. What would have happened if she was not? What would have happened if the baby was disabled? This movie did not even address these issues. Chilean writer Ariel Dorfman refers to this as a secret education which is interpreted from children’s books and movies. This secret education has young adults and children accept life as it is portrayed in these books and media. “And often the world depicts the domination of one sex, one race, one class, or one country over a weaker counterpart. (126 Christensen)” This movie addresses no realistic issues and contributes to this secret education that Dorfman and Christensen write about.