“I've always kind of been obsessed about movies; I've loved movies since I was a little kid. I'm not sure if it's a response to watching or being on set when I was growing up, or just my love of being in movie theaters. I think the end, I love telling stories… I love telling stories, I love telling jokes, and I think that filmmaking is telling stories on the grandest scale."

“I love editing. Editing is where it all comes together. Writing is incredibly difficult; it takes a lot of discipline. Being on set is kind of managerial, you're at an in-between stage of storytelling, you've already come up with an idea, you can't yet put it together, so you have to kind of record it to film. And editing is the process where you actually see your movie come together.”

Jason Reitman is the son of the director Ivan Reitman (of Ghostbusters fame) and actress Geneviève Robert.  He describes himself as a child as “a loser ... a movie geek [and] shy”.  In the late 80s he worked as a production assistant and acted in small parts in his father’s films, and spent time with him editing films.   He majored in English and Creative Writing at the University of Southern California.  In his twenties he made several short films and declined the offer of directing the comedy film, Dude, Where’s My Car?  In 2004 he married writer Michelle Lee with whom he wrote the script for the short comedy film, Consent.  His first feature film, Thank You for Smoking was a critical success but it was Juno which brought him to worldwide attention.