Details

Release year: 2009

Storyline

Ryan's job is to travel around the country, firing people. When his boss hires Natalie, who proposes firing people via video conference, he tries to convince her that her method is a mistake.

Top credits

Directors

Jason Reitman

Writers

Cast

George Clooney — Ryan Bingham
Vera Farmiga — Alex Goran
Anna Kendrick — Natalie Keener
Jason Bateman — Craig Gregory

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Awards

0 wins & 6 nominations

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Did you know

• When Bob shows Ryan a photo of his two children, it is a photo of J.K. Simmons's real children.

• A large number of the people who are fired in the film are not actors but people who were recently laid off. The filmmakers put out ads in St. Louis and Detroit posing as a documentary crew looking to document the effect of the recession. When people showed up, they were instructed to treat the camera like the person who fired them and respond as they did, or use the opportunity to say what they wished they had. A way to discern the actors from the real people is that the real people do not have dialogue with George Clooney or Anna Kendrick, as they were shot separately. Jason Reitman did this intentionally, feeling that the real people would freak out Clooney and Kendrick.

• Vera Farmiga used a body double for her nude scene. In an interview she stated she has no problem being naked in a film, but she had recently given birth and "The breast milk running down would have been inappropriate."