In a Guardian series where writers celebrate their favourite comfort films, one contributor explains why the 2009 comedy-drama Up in the Air, starring George Clooney, remains their go-to feelgood film, particularly for watching on flights. Directed by Jason Reitman and based on Walter Kirn's novel, the film follows corporate downsizer Ryan Bingham, whose life of near-constant air travel is upended when a young colleague's plan to conduct redundancies via video call threatens his profession and forces him to reassess his rootless existence.

The writer, who travelled extensively in their early twenties around the time of the film's release, says it captured their own wanderlust and has become a film watched repeatedly during journeys. Beyond its depiction of airport life and Clooney's meticulous travel routine, the piece highlights the film's emotional core: Bingham's empathy towards those he lays off, a doomed romance with a character played by Vera Farmiga, and themes around duty of care in the workplace that the writer finds newly relevant amid the rise of AI.