It’s like “The Office,” only with no takes to the camera and both male and female full frontal nudity. And I mean that in a good way.
“Hannah Takes The Stairs” was my first foray into the genre now known and made sub-popular as mumblecore. Mumblecore is defined in wikipedia as: “An American Independent film movement that arose in the early 2000’s. It is primarily characterized by ultra-low budget production (often employing digital video cameras), focus on personal relationships between twenty-somethings, improvised scripts, and non-professional actors.”
“Hannah” happens to fit that very definition. As it turns out, the film was apparently directed without a script by one of mumblecore’s pioneers - Joe Swanberg. The film is the epitome of honest and at times unbearably uncomfortable because of how real it feels. The characters feel less like characters in this dramedy and more like the people you eavesdrop on at your favorite restaurant or grocery store.
Greta Gerwig stars as Hannah, a twenty-something that just can’t seem to make up her mind about what she wants and who she wants to be with. We witness her clumsiness as she tries to figure out how to break up with a guy she doesn’t really like anymore and then land head first in the middle of an office love triangle. At heart she hast the best of intentions, but as mentioned before - she just can’t seem to make up her mind.
Gerwig takes the role and runs with it. As a screenwriter and playwright she can definitely find her way through a scene with the proper vocabulary. And at times the scenes that she shares with the rest of the cast are so realistic it feels as if they might be in some form of a documentary. This is especially true when dealing with nudity between the cast members - Gerwig especially. Instead of gratuitous nudity to enhance the sex appeal of a film, Hannah is naked - well just because people are sometimes. Case in point - the ending that easily tops “Juno” for most adorable boyfriend/girlfriend musical sequence.
By the time the movies titles popped up with a bright yellow background, Hannah was a girl I liked, but probably shouldn’t - because I didn’t know whether or not she was going to break my heart if I met her in the street.
