Greta Gerwig
Mickey Sumner
Michael Zegen
Adam Driver

Noah Baumbach
Greta Gerwig

86 mins.
Comedy, Drama
May 17, 2013

Rated R for sexual references and language. (MPAA)

“Frances Ha” reminds me of being in an acting class, watching a pretty good first draft of a scene that needs direction. And instead of sounding like real people in a conversation, the actors sound like they got their lines from a script, which was written by the star of the film, Greta Gerwig, and the director, Noah Baumbach. According to the Los Angeles Times, Gerwig is part of a recent trend of actresses writing or co-writing the screenplay of a film in which they star; Zoe Kazan (“Ruby Sparks”) and Rashida Jones (“Celeste and Jesse Forever”) were other examples of this, but their films were actually really good.

In this film, the dialogue doesn’t quite flow properly. This might have been fixed with a little more rehearsal and, again, proper direction. Or this may be the result of an inelegant attempt at “realism.”

Actually, maybe the problem lies with Gerwig’s acting. She doesn’t do the best job of connecting her character’s leaps of logic from moment to moment. She’s not bad at it, though. She’s just not really good at it, and this film relies on her. Some of the supporting cast does a better job. This year, Gerwig received a Golden Globe nomination for this, too. Hmmm. Well, I guess that’s because of her naturalistic (i.e. awkward) acting, which is all anyone seems to care about nowadays. Her dancing is spot-on for the character, though: not bad, just barely OK in an awkward way, of course. Amy Adams would have been perfect for this.

Some of this film’s better moments occur when multiple characters are involved in a conversation. Then, the tangential writing starts to click. Whatever. In any case, it seems that Baumbach was content to let the actors do their own thing while he worried about everything else (including the black-and-white photography chosen to mimic certain Woody Allen films – I get that, but this is closer to the mediocre Allen films, at best). While Baumbach did a great job of directing “The Squid and the Whale,” that may have been due to his connection to its semi-autobiographical script. He had less success with “Margot at the Wedding”; this film is closer to that.

About halfway into “Frances Ha,” things start to gel a little better. It may be that the character of Frances works better as a film subject when she’s surrounded by people who aren’t in her circle of friends. Her peculiarities are highlighted more effectively in that context. Both “Margot” and this film aren’t bad; but that doesn’t mean they’re worth your time.

Verdict: OK

About: (Source: fandango.com/francesha)

Directed by Noah Baumbach, Frances Ha stars Greta Gerwig as Frances, a twentysomething Brooklynite barely making a living as an apprentice with a dance company. Her greatest happiness is the friendship she shares with Sophie (Mickey Sumner), but when Sophie moves away, Frances goes on a downward spiral that includes unemployment, failing to find the right guy, and moving into a series of smaller and smaller apartments. Co-written by Baumbach and Gerwig, Frances Ha screened at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival.