‘Frances Ha’ Remains Relevant
Greta Gerwig in Frances Ha | Credit: IFC Films
Frances Ha follows the titular Frances (Greta Gerwig) as she navigates the ups and downs of adulthood.
This film is so much fun! It’s another great team-up of Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach. Frances Ha is smart, funny, and whimsical. It also has a thread of melancholy throughout and is grounded by a number of relevant themes.
Frances is such a fun and quirky character, but she’s also incredibly relatable. She also goes through a number of life changes throughout the film that we’ve all gone through in our lives.
The film opens with Frances and her best friend Sophie (Mickey Sumner) just having fun in a park. Though they are two adult women, they are so light-hearted. They play fight with each other without any thought about the people around them. These best friends also live together and depend on each other for everything.
But throughout the film their relationship changes. Sophie moves out, leaving Frances with no furniture (of course all of the furniture was Sophie’s) and needing to find a new place to live. We see Frances live in a number of different locations, each revealing something new about her and the journey that she is on.
As Frances moves around New York, Sophie also experiences changes in her life. As these two friends move in different directions, there are moments of distance. Their friendship that was once so close has to evolve as they evolve, which is something that I’m sure we’ve all experienced throughout our lives. A friend moves away or gets married or has kids and the relationship isn’t what it used to be. And this film brilliantly captures that tension.
Greta Gerwig, Michael Zegen, and Adam Driver in Frances Ha | Credit: IFC Films
Frances Ha also highlights the difficulty of pursuing your dream. Frances wants to be a dancer in a company. When we meet her, she is an apprentice, which doesn’t pay enough. She continues to pursue her craft and work hard at her job, but she’s just not getting any breaks.
At times she is adamant that she’s going to dance in a company. But we also see moments when she has to get another job to pay the bills. It’s a really fascinating journey that she goes on that is really relatable to anyone who has tried to do something artistic for a living.
Part of Frances’ journey is learning that making your dreams come true doesn’t always look how you might expect. In the end, Frances does have to make some compromises, but that’s not a bad thing. It’s just part of growing up.
This is an example of how Frances Ha maintains a balance between the joy of dreams and the weight of reality. Frances is so fun and vibrant, and she brings that energy to every single thing she does. This means that even the difficult things in her life are infused with this joy. But that doesn’t make the hard things any less hard.
The mix of melancholy and joy throughout this film helps make it a joy to watch. Frances isn’t divorced from reality, but is navigating through it with whimsy and wonder. And, as a person who can sometimes be too serious and even cynical, Frances holds an important reminder for me as I navigate through difficult things.
Mickey Sumner and Greta Gerwig in Frances Ha | Credit: IFC Films
Frances Ha is such a fun film. It follows a wonderfully whimsical character who goes through seasons of life that are relatable to many of us. The dialogue is witty, and the screenplay is layered with many important and meaningful themes. This is a film that I’ve grown to absolutely love, and I can’t recommend it enough!