Review of Greenberg (2010) by Roger O — 09 Jan 2011

If you haven't seen Sofia Coppola's Somewhere yet, you probably have seen the trailer. As "I'll Try Anything Once" fits perfectly to the film, the same goes to "Please Don't Follow Me" and Greenberg. James Murphy' song couldn't translate better Noah Baumbach's movie. "Going, out, going out. Please don't follow me, because the way we met. Please don't follow me, because of the way that you act". Simple, sweet, melancholic. I'm sure sweet is not the proper word to describe it, but I love how honest and real the characters and situations are.

Without artifices, without huge happenings, Greenberg is as simple and "slow down" as life is. I wouldn't say Noah Baumbach is the new Woody Allen, but they sure share some similarities beyond the fact both were born in Brooklyn and have a taste for "neurotic intellectual characters". Los Angeles has a central role as New York does in Manhattan or both New York and Los Angeles in Annie Hall. Roger Greenberg feels so uncomfortable as Alvy Singer felt in LA, but he lacks of what I might say it's is the main difference between Allen's and Baumbach's characters: a certain lightness . Allen's are enjoyable neurotic people, when Baumbach's are mostly painful, like Margot and Bernard Berkman. However, I don't see Greenberg like the jerk depressing guy or whatever everyone is saying. He's only vulnerable , incapable of taking part in life, in a life he didn't plan on : "Are you pulling a Gatsby and watching the party from afar?", Ivan asks. "l don't know that l need to document the reasons how this isn't like a Gatsby", says Roger. It's hard to look back and admit you did the wrong choice, to embrace a life that is very far from what you expected. It's hard to be lost between an "adult and responsible" life all your friends are living and a new world where you don't seem to fit in.

"Are you kids really different from me? l mean, do the movies, and the iPods, and the facility with MySpace pages make you guys really different? Every article l read seems to be saying that. (...) The thing about you kids is you're all kind of insensitive. There's a confidence in you guys that's horrifying. l'm freaked out by you kids. I hope l die before l end up meeting one of you in a job interview".

I'm freaked out by those kids too and there's not even 10 years aparting us. There's definitely a confidence in them that's horrifying, but horrifying for being such an empty, meaningless generation. But ,hopefully, there's a happy medium. Florence is a sort of lost-somehow lonely- but full of life adorable young woman. She is not a complex or that interesting character, but she's so refreshing that is impossible to not like her. Greta Gerwig has such a lively and natural acting that she catches you in the first scenes, driving to the Greenberg's. There's something really nice about her and Florence definitely has a lot of Annie Hall. Like Allen's film is not only about Annie, Greenberg is not only about Roger, but if Annie "only exists" attached to Alvy (we only see her life without him, ex boyfriends, etc, through/because of him), Florence lives beyond Roger. The film opens with her and closes with him, in a very lovely scene (despite the title, both are main characters). She does bring life to his boredom, but not exactly in the common meaning of that saying: even if not purposely, she helps him to face himself. Hurt people hurt people, but some of us still can love them.

*F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby, also mentioned in The Squid and the Whale, must really had been an important book to Baumbach. How much biographical is The Squid and the Whale? Or maybeBaumbach feels himself as Gatsby?