10 Movies That Just Tried Way Too Hard

9. Juno (2007)

juno "That's one doodle that can't be un-did, homeskillet!" Is there another movie so irritatingly and self-consciously quirky as Juno? I sincerely doubt it (though Garden State gives it a run for its money). And though both movies are genuinely good and effective in places, they both suffer from an extreme case of hipsteritis, which is something that I've just made up, but am pretty sure is spreading around the globe at an alarming rate. Okay, so Juno won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay, but then again, Crash won one for Best Picture - it's a messed up world, people! Diablo Cody penned the script, of course, which launched Ellen Page into the limelight, and made sitting around with your boyfriend playing quirky songs on a guitar, and hamburger-shaped phones cool for a few weeks. At the time, we all jumped on the Juno bandwagon, relishing phrases like "Honest to blog" and the movie's anti-abortion stance, but in retrospect it's an insanely annoying watch. The feeling is that of a movie so primed to become an indie sleeper hit that it becomes actually ridiculous. Watch it again: you'll want to strangle Juno, I assure you.
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All-round pop culture obsessive.