Teen girl power comes of age


‘Juno’
Director: Jason Reitman
Screenplay: Diablo Cody
Fox Searchlight, 2007

Teen girl power has grown up with this film. Before, American TV had given us shows like ‘Buffy The Vampire Slayer’ (1997-2003) in which teenage girls assumed dynamic, leadership roles and knew stuff that adults didn’t. The grown-ups were the innocents whilst the youngsters inhabited the ‘real’ world; yet the daft plot-lines made it all, well, puerile. Still, Buffy and other teen TV and film protagonists were emotionally and linguistically adult, clearly sexual although not yet having sex; and this was a lot edgier than, say, the 1980s Walt Disney universe of girls rehearsing for human relationships by becoming besotted with animals.

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