Craig forces the resentful Ryan to take uptight young Natalie on the road with him, to show her the ropes before the new virtual-sacking techniques are rolled out. Yet things get complicated he has messy family issues with his sisters, and then his own boss Craig (Jason Bateman) introduces him to the dynamic young employee Natalie (Anna Kendrick) who has invented new iChat-style firing, which can be done over a webcam, long-distance, thus making expensive air-travel and Ryan's wonderfully footloose existence redundant. Ryan is moreover having a delicious no-strings affair with another sexy exec with whom his flight-paths cross: Alex, played by Vera Farmiga, tells him she has the same uncomplicated needs as him: 'Think of me as you, but with a vagina.'

Reitman has some great moments when Ryan must come home, and we see how entering his neglected apartment is like returning to a hotel room the maid, inexplicably, has not cleaned: depressing and scuzzy in the harsh daylight. Above all, he loves hotels and hotel rooms, perfectly neat, anonymous, with soothing, subdued lighting. He loves the weightless sense of non-responsibility in never being home he adores airports with their consumer-opportunities he thrills to the submissive, company-prescribed greeting to which he is entitled, as a frequent flyer, at the fast-track check-in. It is smooth, plausible Ryan – and Clooney plays a corporate creation not unlike his fixit lawyer in the 2007 thriller Michael Clayton – who must set up shop in some small office, call in dozens of people one by one, and give them the bad news, along with the smooth, hypnotic pep-talk about it being a challenge and an opportunity. The bosses lack the nerve to do the firings themselves. In theory, Ryan gets called in because he has the expertise in 'outplacement' counselling, which the ailing companies do not have in-house. The landscape they form is the setting for Jason Reitman's recession satire Up in the Air, about a certain Ryan Bingham, played by George Clooney, a guy who is employed by a human resources consultancy to travel around the country, pretty well 52 weeks in the year, firing people. Unlike any room in your own house, in which you have a clear sense of its position relative to the other rooms and the position of your house relative to the surrounding neighbourhood, these are non-places – formless, temporary way-stations of commerce, existing outside geography. Fehr, Vohn Ferguson, Doug Fesler, Patrick Fox, Lanette Fugit, Bobby J.I n 1992, social scientist Marc Augé published his book Non-Places, a study of how we are increasingly accustomed to 'dead-space' zones such as airport departure lounges, corporate HQ reception areas, the escalator-stairwells in shopping malls, and hotel corridors with couches on which no one will ever sit. Chevalier, Alissa Collins, Kevin Crawford, Sara Crowell, Jeremy Curran, Rodney Davis, Karla Dieseldorff, Vanessa Elgrichi, Dona Ellis, Didier Elysee, Chad A. Brown, Ed Callison, Brian Carney, Jeff Carr, Shawn I. Martilotti, Erin Welsh-Krengel, Marlene Gorkiewicz, Mark Sommers, Wilbur Weidlich, Grace Smith, Scott Lapinski, George Batten,, Sope Aluko, Mike Ancrile, Kojo Asiedu, Patrick Austin, Courtney Benjamin, Michael Bentele, Nicole Blaszczyk, Kourtney Brown, Wayne E.

Darnell Lewis, Jo Michelle Favaro, Stephanie Janiunas, Thomas M. Norman, Casey Bartels, Billy Phelan, Art Hill, Patricia Allison, David F. Simmons, Sam Elliott, Danny McBride, Zach Galifianakis, Chris Lowell, Steve Eastin, Marvin Young, Lucas MacFadden, Adrienne Lamping, Meagan Flynn, Dustin Miles, Tamara Tungate, Laura Ackermann, Meghan Maguire, Courtney Kling, Matt O'Toole, Alan David, Erin McGrane, Cari Mohr, Jerry Vogel, Adhir Kalyan, Jeff Witzke, Dave Engfer, Paul Goetz, Michele Lee, Jennifer Flaks, Bill Yancey, John Mebruer, Ellen Gutierrez, Adam Rose, Kevin Pila, Kelly Bertha, Cozy Bailey, Lamorris Conner, Deborah L. All actors – George Clooney, Vera Farmiga, Anna Kendrick, Jason Bateman, Amy Morton, Melanie Lynskey, J.K.

Up in the air