Something to watch tonight: Tuesday 13 May
Frances Ha (Baumbach, 2012)
After all this time I am now utterly immune to the teasing I get from friends when I mention that I attended the 2012 Telluride Film Festival. It was a seminal event in my life and I take any chance I get – in these penurious times – to remind myself that it actually happened.
The first screening I went to of Frances Ha at Telluride was actually the world premiere but there were sound problems that caused understandable (and visible) distress to co-creator and star of the film, Greta Gerwig.
I picked it up again later during the festival’s “catch-up Monday” and wrote this a couple of days later:
Frances Ha also seemed thin while I was watching it but has actually haunted me a lot more than other films I saw this weekend, tricky little blighter. Greta Gerwig (also co-writer) plays an unsuccessful dancer trying to make it in New York and having her natural optimism challenged at every turn. A kind of comedy-of-hipster-manners, it evidently is being compared to the TV series Girls (which I haven’t seen) but seems to stand well-enough alone in my opinion.
The luminous black and white photography (looking like early Jarmusch) makes New York seem other-worldly, which is an odd thing to be typing while I’m actually sitting here in New York. Like I said, I’ve found myself thinking about this one a lot more than I expected and I’d like to see it again. Will it get NZ audiences? Maybe, but would go down really well at something like the Showcase.
While I was in Telluride I attempted some lame celebrity photography:
Anyway, a year later Frances Ha did get a local release:
The black and white can’t help but remind you of another great New York story, Allen’s Manhattan, but it – and the choice of Delerue’s music – also harks back to the French New Wave and the film tries to be similarly light on its feet.
Gerwig plays Frances, 20-something Manhattanite, still upbeat about her prospects as a dancer and citizen of the city that never sleeps despite the growing evidence that she doesn’t actually have what it takes. If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere, the song tells us, but what do you do if you can’t?
I’m not sure how generally applicable her story is – I’ve heard anything in a range from “quite” to “very” – but it certainly works specifically and Gerwig (co-writer) simply owns one of the great New York characters. It’s over a year since I saw Frances Ha, considered it a bit disposable at first, but moments keep coming back to me – there’s not many films I can say that about.
Also featured in that September 2013 column: Diane Kruger as Marie Antoinette in Farewell, My Queen; Kristin Scott-Thomas in French drama Looking for Hortense; Kick-Ass 2 (which I liked better than the nasty first Kick-Ass); The Mortal Instruments: City of Bones (“cast more on price than on talent”); ensemble drama Tasting Menu which was a rare walk-out for me; and Joss Whedon’s excellent Much Ado About Nothing (which was shot in his house in 12 days while he was editing The Avengers).
Where to watch Frances Ha
Aotearoa: Digital rental from AroVision or streaming on Beamafilm (from participating libraries)
Australia: Streaming on Beamafilm (from participating libraries)
Canada: Streaming on Prime Video, Crave, Criterion Channel, Mubi or IFC Films Unlimited
Ireland: Streaming on Mubi or Prime Video
India: Not currently available online
USA: Streaming on Criterion Channel, Philo, Mubi or IFC Films unlimited
UK: Streaming on Prime Video, Mubi or BFI Player