Smart and engaging, but too many meandering breeze-shooting sequences.
Comment
01/09/09
Hannah Takes the Stairs (2007)
58
%
Tomatometer
How does the Tomatometer work 
Reviews Counted:45
Fresh:26
Rotten:19
Average Rating:5.8/10
Consensus: Although not terribly focused, Hannah Takes the Stairs contains refreshing realism.
Reviews for Hannah Takes the Stairs
Top CriticIt’s never enough to establish any sensitivity or social pertinence beyond the trifling tiffs which are playing out on screen.
01/09/09
Top CriticLess dazed and confused than mumbling and mundane, this drama focuses on social awkwardness and twentysomething blues. Skipping aimlessly from scene to scene it offers little observations and rewards low expectations.
01/09/09
Top CriticThere’s only so much twentysomething navel-gazing one can listen to before wanting to slap some sense — and some fully formed sentences — into them all.
01/09/09
Top CriticThere is something teeth-grindingly cutesy about the whole thing, reaching epic levels of dippiness in the, ahem, nude trumpet-playing scenes. That makes it sound interesting, come to think of it, and perhaps it is.
01/09/09
Top CriticFor every revelatory moment of sharp perception there’s an eternity of goofy smiles, stuttered dialogue and embarrassed glances.
01/09/09
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01/09/09
Top CriticHannah Takes the Stairs, the latest comedy of mannerisms in the “mumblecore” style, is maddening for 60 of its 83 minutes.
01/09/09
The film meanders along in conversational style, encouraging improvisational realism but also the thought that maybe these middle-class characters, not quite slackers, are less interesting than they, or the director, think they are.
01/09/09
Watchable independent drama from the mumblecore crowd, though it's not quite sharp enough, funny enough or insightful enough to really get off the ground and the characters are occasionally irritating.
01/09/09
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04/23/09
Goes full blast on geek chatter.
07/07/08
Joe Swanberg's film wears out its welcome about halfway through its 83 minutes.
11/30/07
Swanberg can be playful behind the camera -- he has a taste for Godardian jump cuts -- and his sense of color is crisp. Gerwig, his millennial Jean Seberg, is no pixie; her captivating ordinariness helps hold the movie together.
10/26/07
[Director] Swanberg nails the inane fun of youth.
10/19/07
Top CriticNo one involved seems to have any thoughts about why people are selfish and cruel to each other, but they're more than willing to complain about it.
10/18/07
Chop off a star if you're not up for highly experimental cinema.
10/18/07
When it works, it works like a charm.
09/28/07
Perfectly encapsulates the slow-motion, frustrated feeling of early adulthood, when longing and inchoate desire easily outnumber actual transformative events and achievements.
09/28/07
Top CriticPerformances help raise Hannah Takes the Stairs above the realm of self-indulgent cinema to something worth seeing.
09/27/07
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August 21, 2007:
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