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37-543: Frances Ha is a 2012 American black-and-white comedy-drama film directed by Noah Baumbach . It is written by Baumbach and Greta Gerwig , who also stars as Frances Halladay, a struggling 27-year-old dancer. The film premiered at the Telluride Film Festival on September 1, 2012, and was given a limited theatrical release in the United States on May 17, 2013, by IFC Films . Frances Halladay

74-500: A 50mm prime lens and a 70–200mm zoom lens , rarely employing 35mm and 85mm prime lenses because they lacked the mechanics and features common among cinema lenses (when paired with the camera’s large full-frame sensor, they make it difficult to maintain focus ). By using a very small camera and extremely limited lighting equipment, the production could quickly and easily move locations without attracting much attention. Without large crews, elaborate sets, and special visual effects,

111-446: A Virginia restaurant with several police officers seated nearby and threatens to reveal Ray's parole violations unless he allows Audrey to leave with him. He demands that Ray hand over his wallet and car keys and leaves the check with Ray to force him to stay behind as they flee. Ray is saved from this dilemma by a shop girl he had met earlier. Charlie takes Audrey to his Stony Brook, Long Island , home, but their idyllic suburban retreat

148-466: A black-and-white image, that is, an image containing shades of gray, is referred to in this context as grayscale . Something Wild (1986 film) Charlie Driggs is a conventional yuppie investment banker who works in New York City. After he leaves a greasy spoon diner without paying, a wildly dressed woman with a brunette bob who calls herself Lulu confronts him. Lulu offers Charlie

185-402: A brief period. Sophie and Frances's relationship struggles as Sophie and her boyfriend, Patch, grow closer. Frances learns that the dance company does not need her to work their Christmas show, which means Frances can no longer afford the apartment. She visits her hometown of Sacramento for Christmas where she sees her family and reconnects with high school friends. Rachel, a fellow dancer in

222-433: A convenience store. He pistol-whips a clerk and breaks Charlie's nose. They drive to a cheap motel, where Ray forces Charlie to admit his wife left him (having learned this from Charlie's colleague at the class reunion). Realizing Charlie has deceived her, Audrey stays behind with Ray. Despite Ray warning him to stay away from him and Audrey, Charlie secretly tails the couple as they leave the motel. Charlie confronts Ray in

259-473: A modest but satisfying existence as a fledgling choreographer, teaching dance to young children, and as a bookkeeper for her former dance company. She rents her own apartment. Upon moving in, Frances writes her name down onto a slip of paper in order to mark her new mailbox. Her full last name does not fit, so she folds the paper to read: "Frances Ha". Frances Ha was directed by Noah Baumbach , and written by Baumbach and Greta Gerwig. Gerwig, who also stars in

296-553: A relief that Frances Ha isn't as assertively frank, in the 'Look, ma, no shame!' way, as Girls . And this is partly Gerwig's vision, too. No other movie has allowed her to display her colors like this. Frances is a little dizzy and frequently maddening, but Gerwig is precise in delineating the character's loopiness: Her lines always hit just behind the beat, like a jazz drummer who pretends to flub yet knows exactly what's up". Peter Debruge, reviewing for Variety , described Frances Ha : "This modest monochromatic lark doesn't present

333-435: A ride downtown but instead heads for New Jersey and throws his beeper from the moving car. Lulu openly drinks liquor while driving and stops in a town to buy more. While Charlie phones his office, Lulu — unbeknownst to him — robs a liquor store. Charlie claims the cash he is carrying is for his Christmas club account, but Lulu persuades him to pay for a room at a roadside motel. Once inside she handcuffs him to

370-535: A story—or even a traditional sequence of scenes—so much as it offers spirited glimpses into the never-predictable life of Frances, a 27-year-old dancer." He said Frances was "a character whose unexceptional concerns and everyday foibles prove as compelling as any New York-set concept picture, delivering an affectionate, stylishly black-and-white portrait of a still-unfledged Gotham gal". Sarah Galo of Mic also noted that Frances Ha “is really quite daring in its portrayal of female friendship. Frances and Sophie go through

407-410: Is E. Max Frye's original screenplay, which is better thought out in terms of its narrative than of the characters." In his seminal work Postmodernism , American theorist Fredric Jameson uses the film's premises, along with others' such as that of Orson Welles ' The Trial , for his observations on the possibilities for rebellion in modern or postmodern capitalist society. Something Wild

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444-643: Is a 27-year-old dancer who lives in New York City with her best friend from college, Sophie. Her life is upended when Sophie tells her she plans to relocate from Brooklyn to Tribeca , which Sophie considers her dream neighborhood, with a different friend. Frances, a struggling would-be dancer working as an apprentice at a dance company, is unable to afford the Brooklyn apartment alone and is forced to find someplace else to live. She moves to Chinatown and shares an apartment with her friends Lev and Benji for

481-491: Is also known as greyscale in technical settings. The history of various visual media began with black and white, and as technology improved, altered to color. However, there are exceptions to this rule, including black-and-white fine art photography , as well as many film motion pictures and art film (s). Early photographs in the late 19th and early to mid 20th centuries were often developed in black and white, as an alternative to sepia due to limitations in film available at

518-516: Is falling in love with her. Lulu confesses that her real name is Audrey and introduces Charlie as her husband to her mother, Peaches, at her Pennsylvania home. She appears as a demure blonde, having removed her brunette wig. She takes Charlie to her high school reunion, where a former classmate recognizes him as his office colleague. Audrey's violent ex-convict husband, Ray Sinclair, also appears and makes clear that he wants her back. After ditching his date, Ray takes Audrey and Charlie along while he robs

555-480: Is holding. Audrey is taken away for questioning when the police arrive. Charlie later quits his job and looks for Audrey at her apartment, but finds she has moved. Outside the diner where Charlie met Audrey, a waitress accuses him of leaving without paying. Audrey suddenly appears with the cash he left on the table in her hand. Stylishly dressed and with elegant makeup, she smiles and invites Charlie into her woodie station wagon and back into her life. Something Wild

592-404: Is literally shattered when Ray hurls a patio chair through their sliding glass door. He severely beats Charlie and handcuffs him to the pipes under the bathroom sink before attacking Audrey. Charlie frees himself by pulling the pipes apart and strangles Ray with the handcuffs. During the scuffle, Charlie retrieves Ray's dropped knife. Ray dies when he accidentally impales himself on the knife Charlie

629-580: Is waitressing. Frances learns they are engaged and sees the couple get into a fight. She lets a drunk Sophie stay with her in the dorm room she's been given, where Sophie reveals that she suffered a miscarriage while in Japan and is unhappy in her relationship. Sophie goes back to New York City the next morning, leaving a note for Frances. Some time later, Frances returns to Washington Heights in Manhattan . Frances eventually reconciles with Sophie and enjoys

666-868: The United States on May 17, 2013, and was released on Blu-ray and DVD on the Criterion Collection label on November 12, 2013. The review aggregation website Rotten Tomatoes gives Frances Ha a 93% approval rating based on 186 reviews, with an average score of 7.80/10. The website's critical consensus is: "Audiences will need to tolerate a certain amount of narrative drift, but thanks to sensitive direction from Noah Baumbach and an endearing performance from Greta Gerwig, Frances Ha makes it easy to forgive." Metacritic calculated an average score of 82 out of 100 based on 35 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim". Stephanie Zacharek of The Village Voice praised Gerwig's performance, writing, "It's

703-563: The New Yorker , stated: " Something Wild is rough-edged. It doesn’t have the grace of Demme's Citizens Band and Melvin and Howard or the heightened simplicity of his Stop Making Sense . It has something else, though -- a freedom that takes off from the genre framework." A more mixed review from Vincent Canby of the New York Times stated: "The performances are, without exception, good. The film's principal difficulty

740-416: The bed. She phones his boss and puts the receiver to his head while they are having sex, forcing him into an awkward conversation. Later Charlie pretends to phone his wife but Lulu is unaware that his marriage ended nine months ago. After sharing a meal with Lulu at an Italian restaurant, Charlie realizes he is unable to pay with what little cash he has left. Lulu leaves him with the check, forcing him to flee

777-675: The company, lets Frances stay with her for a few weeks. During dinner with Rachel's family, Frances discovers that Sophie has quit her job at Random House and is moving to Tokyo with Patch. Frances, on a whim, decides to spend an uneventful couple of days in Paris that she pays for with a credit card. She returns to Vassar , her alma mater , to work as a waitress and summer resident assistant . Overworked and not allowed to take classes, Frances reads Sophie's blog of her life in Tokyo. One night, Sophie and Patch are at an alumni auction where Frances

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814-446: The film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale. Chicago Sun-Times film critic Roger Ebert rated the film 3 1 ⁄ 2 -stars-out-of-4 and stated " Something Wild is quite a movie. Demme is a master of finding the bizarre in the ordinary. The accomplishment of Demme and the writer, E. Max Frye, is to think their characters through before the very first scene. They know all about Charlie and Lulu, and so what happens after

851-542: The film, announced it in April 2012, though Baumbach's involvement was not revealed until the film's listing in the Telluride Film Festival 's lineup. Gerwig had starred in Baumbach's 2010 film Greenberg , and they decided to collaborate again. They exchanged ideas, developed characters and eventually co-wrote the script. Gerwig has said that she did not anticipate starring in the film as well, but Baumbach thought she suited

888-487: The late 1960s, few mainstream films have been shot in black-and-white. The reasons are frequently commercial, as it is difficult to sell a film for television broadcasting if the film is not in color. 1961 was the last year in which the majority of Hollywood films were released in black and white. In computing terminology, black-and-white is sometimes used to refer to a binary image consisting solely of pure black pixels and pure white ones; what would normally be called

925-425: The latter to emulate, in part, collaborations by Woody Allen and his cinematographer Gordon Willis , in films like Manhattan (1979). CBS News compared Frances Ha ' s style to the works of Woody Allen , Jim Jarmusch and François Truffaut . Black-and-white Black-and-white ( B&W or B/W ) images combine black and white to produce a range of achromatic brightnesses of grey . It

962-513: The meeting outside that restaurant is almost inevitable, given who they are and how they look at each other. This is one of those rare movies where the plot seems surprised at what the characters do." Chicago Tribune film critic Dave Kehr gave the film a perfect four star review, stating "It's not every day that someone goes Alfred Hitchcock one better, but in Something Wild, Jonathan Demme has done it." Pauline Kael , writing for

999-405: The motions of being BFFs to breaking up to being reunited in the end.” The Los Angeles Times highlighted Gerwig's foray as part of a trend of female actors becoming writers or co-writers; other examples include Zoe Kazan with Ruby Sparks and Rashida Jones with Celeste and Jesse Forever . Baumbach filmed Frances Ha with his cinematographer Sam Levy digitally and in black-and-white ,

1036-715: The often-mordant Baumbach." The film also screened at the Toronto International Film Festival on September 7, 2012, after which IFC Films acquired North- and Latin-American rights to distribute the film in theaters. Frances Ha also screened at the New York Film Festival on September 30, 2012, and at the Edinburgh International Film Festival in June 2013. The film had a limited release in

1073-546: The original theatrical trailer, and a special booklet featuring an essay by film critic David Thompson. The film's soundtrack was released on LP and CD, featuring only 10 of the 49 tracks in the title credits. Notable omissions from the CD were the school reunion songs performed by The Feelies (including " Fame ", " Before the Next Teardrop Falls " and " I'm a Believer "), and The Troggs' " Wild Thing " (which gave

1110-655: The part. Filming locations included New York City , Sacramento , Paris and at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, Baumbach's alma mater. Gerwig cited Joseph Conrad 's novella The Shadow Line and Woody Allen 's film Annie Hall (1977) as inspirations for the film. Baumbach and Gerwig also have cited the films of the French New Wave and Woody Allen as influences, as well as Something Wild (1986) and Lost in America (1985) which they watched during

1147-569: The production could afford to shoot around the world on a fairly limited budget. The filmmakers included a number of pop songs in the film, including " Every 1's a Winner " by Hot Chocolate , " Blue Sway " by Paul McCartney , "Chrome Sitar" by T.Rex , and " Modern Love " by David Bowie . "Modern Love" is featured in a scene in Frances Ha that is a remake of a sequence in Leos Carax 's Mauvais Sang , where Denis Lavant runs through

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1184-701: The production. In the bonus features on the home-video release, the filmmakers said that the film was shot in the style of French New Wave cinema, with the tools of a student filmmaker. Even though the production had both the budget for and access to professional-level cinema cameras and lenses, they chose to use the Canon EOS 5D Mark II , a consumer-grade photographic camera that can record high-definition video . Instead of adapting professional cinema lenses, as other cinematographers have done when working with that camera, they used Canon L-series EF prime and zoom lenses designed for still photography. They mostly used

1221-422: The restaurant to escape an angry chef who demands payment. After spending the night at a motel, Lulu and Charlie awaken to find a police officer and tow truck near the car she drove down an embankment and into a signpost the night before. Lulu abandons the car and buys one from a sleazy used car dealer, leaving Charlie wondering where she got the money. He starts to enjoy Lulu's free-wheeling lifestyle and realizes he

1258-410: The streets. The soundtrack includes a song by Felix Laband and references multiple French films; it contains music by Georges Delerue , Jean Constantin and Antoine Duhamel , who originally wrote for films of the French New Wave . Frances Ha premiered at the Telluride Film Festival on September 1, 2012. The Los Angeles Times said "audiences seemed pleasantly surprised by the warmth from

1295-413: The time. Black and white was also prevalent in early television broadcasts, which were displayed by changing the intensity of monochrome phosphurs on the inside of the screen, before the introduction of colour from the 1950s onwards. Black and white continues to be used in certain sections of the modern arts field, either stylistically or to invoke the perception of a historic work or setting. Since

1332-538: Was acclaimed by critics. The film holds a 91% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 47 reviews, with an average rating of 7.40/10. The website's critical consensus reads: "Boasting loads of quirky charm, a pair of likable leads, and confident direction from Jonathan Demme, Something Wild navigates its unpredictable tonal twists with room to spare." On Metacritic , the film has a weighted average score of 73 out of 100, based on 14 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave

1369-563: Was released on VHS by HBO Video on July 15, 1987. The film was released on DVD by MGM on June 5, 2001, presented in its original 1.85:1 widescreen aspect ratio. The only special feature was the original theatrical trailer. On May 10, 2011, Something Wild was released by The Criterion Collection on DVD and Blu-ray . The Blu-ray has a new, restored high-definition digital transfer, supervised by director of photography Tak Fujimoto and approved by director Jonathan Demme. It also features new video interviews with Demme and writer E. Max Frye,

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