Baumbach's best

I've been up and down on Noah Baumbach but I think Frances Ha is his best movie to date by far, in large part because of the great comic-emotional performance of his lead, Greta Gerwig, as the eponymous "undateable" Frances but also because it seems to truly capture the mood and mode of a generation in a particular time and place - the young and artistic and career-ambitious but (most of them) spoiled and pampered 20-somethings in the maelstrom of NYC - a world of underpaid internships (except for Frances, most or all of the people are from wealthy families who allow the kids to live in seeming poverty but to all of a sudden have enough $ to spring for beautiful clothes, expensive liquor, constant cigarettes) and overpriced rentals. The movie is about Frances's tempestuous friendships, her frustrations as a would-be dancer who's competent but not good enough to move up to the next level, constant anxiety about rent money leading to frequent moves among th boroughs, with a lot of talk, much of it very quirky and funny - Baumbach and Gerwig co-wrote the excellent script - a cool and casual attitude toward sex and a complete failure at long-term relationships - and way too much drinking and self-indulgence. Despite all this we like (or I did anyway) all of the characters, can understand them and forgive them their faults - and we particularly like the buoyant and athletic but socially clumsy Frances/Gerwig - and feel sorry for her as she tries to hang on to her friendships in changing seas, to remain optimistic, and to make the rent - even as her fortunes decline. The movie is shot in Allen-esque b/w, mostly in New York City - but with three excursions: Frances goes home to see family in wholesome and middle-class Sacramento, goes to Paris on a stupid lark that makes her sad and wastes $, and takes a summer job at her alma mater, Vassar, which makes her feel, rightly, that she's going nowhere w/ her life: and w/ each of these locales we see how Baumbach's vision is so different from W. Allen - these are not scenes of beauty but of crowded streets and lonely cafes and scrubby woodlands and at a young woman miles removed from her very conventional but loving and supportive family. Gerwig pushes the age limit for this part, but it will be interesting to see how she grows as an actor and what's next.