A baby, a high school, and esoteric pop culture references once again figure prominently — albeit less glibly — in director Jason Reitman and screenwriter Diablo Cody's first re-teaming since Juno. When Charlize Theron's Mavis, a prom-queen-turned Maker's Mark–guzzling ghost writer of teen novels, learns that her old flame (Patrick Wilson) is a new dad, she births something rather impressive herself: a rampage of self-destruction in her hometown of Mercury, Minnesota. But this wincingly bleak, blackly comic plot to seduce her ex-boyfriend snags an unlikely confidant in Matt (Patton Oswalt), a former classmate literally crippled by the past. As Theron veers between sweatpants and stilettos, her face a mesmerizing canvas of dead despair, ecstatic delusion, and last night's eyeliner, Oswalt proves a worthy foil. Preachy dialogue aside, their subtle chemistry deepens this surprisingly sympathetic portrait of a bitch on the brink.
