Although the performances of Joe Swanberg’s Hannah Takes the Stairs pull strength from the individual visions of several upcoming and influential filmmakers, among them Ry Russo-Young, Mark Duplass, Kent Osborne and Andrew Bujalski, and the film also allows them all to collaborate in a meaningful cinematic interaction, the film falls short entirely of its great expectation. Rather, it serves primarily as a study of narrative ambiguity.

In summary, Hannah, played in a flawless performance by Greta Gerwig, ploughs through the holy trinity of boyfriends Mike (Mark Duplass), Paul (Andrew Bujalski) and Matt (Kent Osborne) and throughout each relationship encounters a subtly-expressed but intensely-charged sense of dissociation. The story on this superficial level appears to pull the strings of emotional intent. However, underneath this layer, the sense of purpose is inherently lost in Hannah.

While the argument that this purposelessness defines Hannah herself, and in such a way gives credibility to and information about her mindset, the idea runs moot as progressively an audience finds little way to connect with her character, considering that she’s not connecting with herself. Hannah, it seems ultimately, doesn’t know who she is; she knows she wants to be funny and to write, but she doesn’t know much more than that. This perhaps is the cause of her omnipresent anxiety throughout the film as well as her tendency to revert to child-like whims. Then again, this only serves as speculation because there’s no clear picture drawn of the character.

But, let’s keep in mind that Swanberg’s debut Kissing on the Mouth played with this same ambiguity of a female protagonist. The only difference here is that Kissing on the Mouth moved in a slow and steady narrative coherence with Ellen (Kate Winterich), who at least connected to her disconnections. In the end, the film drove to a clear message, perfectly defined by its last line. While that film spoke directly to early twenties uncertainty, Hannah doesn’t speak to anything in particular though it may despite that, still speak to someone.

On another level, however, Hannah works with the metaphorically overt, specifically with regards to objects and blocking. During a scene between Hannah and Matt in which they play with magnets, they mutually discover an attraction, or let’s take a later scene between the same characters and Hannah’s roommate Rocco (Ry Russo-Young) in which Hannah slides herself between Matt and Rocco, who at this particular moment happened to be connecting. As she sits between them, she sighs, saying “My work here is done,” a line meant in reference to another instance but stand out enough that it applies too conveniently to the intrusion. The irony of this metaphor blaring comes in the form of a diatribe Hannah launches into in which she claims that she hates the explicit and would much rather see art through subtext. If the subtext however, as here, is so overwhelming, it ceases to be subtext but rather is a markedly poor attempt at it.

It’s important to take a second here and reiterate a point which may have gotten lost along the way of the narrative criticism and this is that the acting overall is superlative. From Russo-Young’s nuance to Bujalski’s ease and humor to Gerwig’s beautifully expressive face, the performances are stunning. Gerwig particulary is an actress with whom much more time could be spent, just in solitude.

It’s the narrative incoherence, however and lack of character focus that undermines Hannah, rendering it less compelling than either Kissing on the Mouth or LOL and much less universal than Young American Bodies.

For more information, visit www.hannahtakesthestairs.com.

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