Film – Frances Ha review

A lot has been written about Frances Ha, or, more specifically, its star, the charmingly named Greta Gerwig. The film, the latest from director (and, not-so-coincidentally, as we shall see, Gerwig’s partner) Noah Baumbach, is a paen to New York hipsters. Shot in black and white, it has been described as an Annie Hall for today, if Woody Allen’s classic had been written by the woman.

Frances is trying to make it as a modern dancer. She lives, first, in Brooklyn with her best friend Sophie, a be-spectacled publishing girl who never reads. They walk around in t-shirts, smoke out of the window and get drunk in China Town. They are, basically, in love. Then things change. Sophie gets a boyfriend. Frances moves out. Poor old Frances, things go from bad to worse. She is turned down for her dance company’s Christmas show. She ends up living with a ghastly ice-queen called Rachel whose pointy face and superior friends drive Frances so nuts that she books a two-night trip to Paris, most of which she sleeps through.

She has FOMO. She misses two parties. Her life may as well be over. She goes home to visit her parents and we see her doing the drying, washing her hair, going to a prayer circle. Things change, slowly. There are odd coincidences and meetings.

Frances is full of self-conscious charm, and the whole film is an offering-up to that most self-canonising of cities, New York. Baumbach (and here we see evidence of his love for the actress) films her running and dancing through the streets. We see her look at herself in the mirror, in bed. She is beautifully lit, even when stuffing her face with a bagel. There is no respite from her kooky quirks. She leaves clothes all over her bedroom floor, which everyone, mysteriously, seems to find deeply enchanting. Her friends are all artists and writers and dancers. They all wear trilbies. They have in-jokes. It is hard to sympathise with them: particularly as they all seem to spend most of their time and resources on getting drunk. Modern dance is hard to take seriously as an artistic calling.

For all its silliness and seriousness, this is a touching film. Gerwig’s vulnerable, beautiful face is truly entrancing, even as the lines she trots out fill one with annoyance. Take a date who thinks she too cool for school, or a little brother on an exeat weekend. Don’t take your mum – it’s too rude. Don’t take your mates – it’s too girly. Take someone who won’t mind laughing at it, and, therefore, laughing a little bit at themselves.