Juno

As painful as it was for this adoptee to watch, I actually liked Juno.

I liked it because it was a big fat reminder of what adoption actually is: a solution for a girl/woman who does not want a baby and the people who want one. (Clarification based on Anonymous comments: I am not talking about young women who were coerced or tricked into signing over their babies).

The baby is just a big bump. Something that gives her heartburn but not heartache. A moving image on an ultrasound that moves the stepmother, but never stirs Juno enough to rethink her decision. Once Juno has made up her mind to give away her baby, she emotionally detaches. She cracks witty jokes. She's fixed on an old-school Closed Adoption and has no interest in updates or pictures. She's determined to hand over the kid and get it behind her. Sure she rubs her belly with a flower, but she spends more time burning CDs than wallowing in angst ridden moments.

So why do I like Juno?

Because there was some truth in it. Some ugly, harsh truth.

Juno reminds me of my own mother. Ever cheerful, determined on her plan of adoption from the first and emotionally detached. Like Juno, my mother also never wanted to see me. She, "didn't want to get attached."

I liked it because it confirmed that society sees adoption as a nifty solution, with little or no thought to what that separation will mean for the baby.

Yeah, don't get bent out of shape because, "it's just a comedy," some will argue. Well, it wouldn't be funny if it didn't ring-a-ding true. (What did not ring true is Juno as a 16-year old. As my own teenager pointed out, teenagers don't talk or act like that and my daughter just wasn't buying Juno as authentic.)

In Juno, the institution of adoption is only vaguely about the child. It's about a transaction. It's about what is being transferred and the comedy that ensues. As Juno's stepmother points out, the adoptive parents could even be worse than her loser stepdaughter. They could be abusive. And while this is oh-so-true, it never gives Juno any real pause or concern. It's a movie about a pregnant girl, after all. Not what will happen to her baby. The movie ends with Juno and her boyfriend singing together, happily. Without the baby. Problem solved. That's what adoption is for everybody else.

What happens afterward is another movie.

What happens afterward is what we adoptees have to live with the rest of our lives.