FRANCES HA: She's Undateable & Her Film Is Just Barely Watchable

Now playing in Raleigh at the Colony Theater, in Durham at the Carolina Theatre, and in Chapel Hill at the Chelsea Theater:


FRANCES HA (Dir. Noah Baumbach, 2012)

Things that came to mind while watching indie “it” girl Greta Gerwig as a lanky loser of a New York-based dancer in Noah Baumbach’s newest, FRANCES HA: She’s adorkable; she’s a mess; she’s irritating; she’s endearing; she’s embarrassing; she’s self absorbed; she’s undateable; can she really still be considered an indie “it” girl?

I dunno, but the next-to-last thought, “undateable” is something I couldn't help thinking because it’s said about the title character throughout the film, mainly by her roommate (Michael Esper), but then by Gerwig herself when reflecting on her own cringe-inducing awkwardness. It could be an alternate title to the movie.

Because it’s in black and white and concerns pretentious New Yorkers, Baumbach’s seventh film as writer/director and second collaboration with girlfriend Gerwig, (GREENBERG, starring Ben Stiller, was their first), can’t help but recall Woody Allen (particularly MANHATTAN), and its portrait of aimless young women in the big city echoes Lena Dunham’s hit HBO show Girls (especially in the casting of Girls regular Adam Driver as a member of Gerwig’s social scene), but sadly FRANCES HA has neither of those influences’ depth.

Gerwig’s Frances (to explain why the movie’s title is FRANCES HA would be a Spoiler I guess), a woman in her late ‘20s who’s been treading water for years as an apprentice for a dance company, loses one of her strongest bonds when her BFF (Mickey Sumner) gets engaged to be married.

This leaves Gerwig to have to figure out alone what to do with her life, as she bounces around couch surfing at friends’ places, stays with her parents in Sacramento (played by her real parents: Christine and Gordon Gerwig), and then even winds up on a two day trip to Paris (where she wastes most of by oversleeping) where, like at the other locations, not much happens.

Gerwig, who co-write the screenplay with boyfriend Baumbach, is a likable presence but this characters’ collection of quirks never fully forms into somebody to relate to or be entertained by, unless nodding one’s head in disapproval at questionable decisions equals entertainment.

While it can be refreshing to see a grainy black and white shaky cam production in this season of CGI spectacle, FRANCES HA ultimately has a less to say than most of the big ass summer movies in the top 5 at the box office right now.

It may work as a showcase for Gerwig’s finely tuned quirkiness, but as a fully functioning film, her and Baumbach’s little art project is a non-starter. Despite a few choice moments, and a few instances of solid acting (as Gerwig’s best friend, Sumner is terrific – especially when her character gets drunk), the movie is as flighty and disconnected as its lead protagonist is. Undateable? Try just barely watchable.

More later...

GREENBERG: The Film Babble Blog Review

GREENBERG
(Dir. Noah Baumbach, 2010)

"I'm really trying to do nothing for a while", Robert Greenberg (Ben Stiller) says repeatedly throughout this low key independent film that matches his nothing scene by scene.

Stiller's acerbic misanthropic New Yorker title character is house-sitting for his brother (Chris Medina) in LA and starts and stops, and starts and stops again, an awkward romance with Greta Gerwig as his brother's personal assistant. That's basically it plot wise. It's a series of scenes in which we cringe anticipating how exactly Stiller will socially sabotage every given situation.

And that really doesn't make for entertaining movie going. It seemed so promising at first. The possibilities of tapping into Stiller's talent for comic anger without cheap laughs, a la what PUNCH DRUNK LOVE did for Adam Sandler, could make for a iconic assessment, but the discomfort that supporting cast members Rhys Ifans and Jennifer Jason Leigh (who is credited for the story - a baffling credit since there barely is one) convey is contagious.

Greenberg, the character, is simply not interesting. He was once a musician that botched a record deal for his band that he's never owned up to, and his so called friends barely tolerate him. He writes complaint letters to every commercial institution that he comes across from American Airlines to Starbucks. And now he can't figure out if he wants to pursue a relationship with a 26 year old woman who is also floating through life with no direction.

You'd think that she'd see that this guy is just an asshole and move on, but maybe there's some actual realism there. Realism may be the film's problem. I mean, Greenberg all too well reminds me of former friends who I stopped hanging out with because they were way too negative and boring.

Many of Stiller's jerk wad exchanges just brought to mind the many times I disgustedly hung up the phone with such folk. When I realized halfway through that this guy was never going to change and there was no point to this slice of his dull life I want to hang up with the movie.

Underwritten and un-affecting; it's a charmless movie about a charmless man. It has echoes of James L. Brook's AS GOOD AS IT GETS which similarly dealt with a socially inept curmudgeon begrudgingly accepting love. That film though had more witty life to it - GREENBERG just sits there. Oh, I should say that Baumbach tries to combat the underlining nothing with a desperate party sequence with snarky kids, drugs, and loud music in the last third.

I like the work of Noah Baumbach a lot more than say Armond White, but here this particular spotlight on self absorption really needed more going for it than just these bare bones slightly spruced up with James Murphy's (LCD Soundsystem) soundtrack (which isn't bad actually).

When asked how he's doing early on, Stiller quips: "Fair to middling, Leonard Maltin would give me 2 and 1/2 stars." If I used a star rating I'd be way less generous.

More later...