Reitman found the book and identified with Bingham. 11th happened and no one wanted to buy a book or certainly see a movie set on airplanes,' Kirn recalls.īut things changed. 'Up in the Air' hit bookshelves in July 2001 - weeks before Sept. 'I felt like a zoologist who'd discovered a new species of monkey deep in the jungle,' Kirn says. The man said he had an apartment in Atlanta but never used it and spent two-thirds of the year traveling. 'I turned to him and asked him where he was from and he said, 'I'm from right here, this seat,'' Kirn recalls. Speaking from his home in Livingston, Mont., Kirn, 47, says he came up with the idea for Clooney's character, Ryan Bingham, while next to a stranger on a flight in 1999. Croix River Valley, became a 2005 indie movie starring Lou Pucci and Tilda Swinton.īut 'Up in the Air' is a mainstream hit and has 'kicked the sales (of the book) in the seat considerably,' says Doubleday executive editor Gerry Howard. 'Thumbsucker,' based on his adolescence in eastern Minnesota's St. It's not the first time a Kirn book has become a movie. That could foreshadow the Academy Awards race nominations are announced Feb. Paramount's 'Up in the Air' has pulled in $63.9 million domestically in seven weeks and won raves for actor George Clooney as a slick ax-man racking up frequent-flier miles as he fires workers for other companies.ĭirector Jason Reitman and co-screenwriter Sheldon Turner won Golden Globes for best screenplay Sunday, but 'Avatar' director James Cameron and his box-office behemoth took top honors at the Globes. 'We dream too big, we're going to be humbled.' But novelist Walter Kirn is taking the pessimistic view of fellow Minnesota writer Garrison Keillor as he watches the movie version of his book, 'Up in the Air,' soar to critical and box office success. MINNEAPOLIS - It's a scenario many authors dream about: Their book becomes a smash movie.

Up in the Air by Walter Kirn