Advanced Search >
Help Me Search

Movies

Weekend Box Office
Film Awards & Top 10s By Year
All-Time High Scores
All-Time Low Scores

Wide Releases
Now In Theaters

sort by namesort by score

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Limited Releases
Now In Theaters

sort by namesort by score

58 (Untitled)
96 35 Shots of Rum
56 Adam
72 Adela
39 Adventures of Power
78 Afghan Star
61 After the Storm
66 Afterschool
xx All the Best
58 American Casino
72 Amreeka
48 Antichrist
73 Araya
62 Art & Copy
55 As Seen Through These Eyes
76 Baader Meinhof Complex, The
86 Beaches of Agnes, The
13 Beautiful Life, A
70 Beeswax
35 Beyond a Reasonable Doubt
71 Big Fan
66 Black Dynamite
51 Blind Date
xx Blind Pig Who Wants to Fly
76 Bliss
35 Blue Tooth Virgin, The
26 Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day, The
57 Boys Are Back, The
45 Brief Interviews with Hideous Men
81 Bright Star
70 Bronson
45 Burning Plain, The
xx Carriers
55 Casi Divas
57 Chelsea on the Rocks
62 Cloud 9
65 Coco Before Chanel
69 Cold Souls
59 Collapse
44 Confessionsofa Ex-Doofus-ItchyFooted Mutha
82 Cove, The
75 Crude
82 Damned United, The
67 Departures
xx Dil Bole Hadippa
71 Disgrace
xx Do Knot Disturb
70 Earth Days
24 Eating Out 3: All You Can Eat
85 Education, An
55 Endgame
xx Eulogy for a Vampire
xx Everyone Else
xx Fatal Promises
56 Fifty Dead Men Walking
62 Five Minutes of Heaven
74 Flame & Citron
49 Food Beware: The French Organic Revolution
80 Food, Inc.
28 Free Style
xx From Mexico with Love
50 Fuel
25 Gentlemen Broncos
50 Give Me Your Hand
58 Gogol Bordello Non-Stop
72 Good Hair
89 Goodbye Solo
52 Grace
64 Harmony and Me
81 Headless Woman, The
xx Heretics, The
63 Horse Boy, The
73 House of the Devil, The
xx How to Seduce Difficult Women
74 Humpday
94 Hurt Locker, The
29 I Hope They Serve Beer in Hell
16 If One Thing Matters: A Film About Wolfgang Tillmans
75 In Search of Beethoven
83 In the Loop
61 Intimate Enemies
42 Irene in Time
70 It Might Get Loud
46 Killing Kasztner
19 Labor Day
xx Laila's Birthday
41 Little Ashes
41 Little Traitor, The
66 Liverpool
34 Looking for Palladin
80 Lorna's Silence
83 Maid, The
xx Ministers, The
59 More Than a Game
67 Most Dangerous Man in America: Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, The
34 Motherhood
62 My One and Only
xx Mystery Team
48 New York, I Love You
73 Night and Day
66 No Impact Man
47 Ong Bak 2: The Beginning
34 Other Man, The
xx Painter Sam Francis, The
54 Paper Heart
xx Paradise
68 Paranormal Activity
68 Paris
44 Peter and Vandy
35 Play the Game
77 Precious: Based on the Novel by Sapphire
xx Pretty Ugly People
65 Providence Effect, The
76 Rembrandt's J'accuse
69 September Issue, The
79 Serious Man, A
40 Shrink
61 Skin
77 Skin Too Few: The Days of Nick Drake, A
xx Skiptracers
46 Splinterheads
39 St. Trinian's
89 Still Walking
50 Stoning of Soraya M., The
55 Storm
65 Tetro
70 That Evening Sun
72 Thirst
xx Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas 3D (re-release)
61 Trucker
xx Turning Green
83 U2 3D
66 Unmade Beds
66 Unmistaken Child
70 Visual Acoustics
55 Walt & El Grupo
67 Way We Get By, The
69 We Live in Public
64 Wedding Song, The
64 Where is Where?
xx White on Rice
74 Woman in Berlin, A
69 World's Greatest Dad
70 Yes Men Fix the World
69 Yoo-Hoo, Mrs. Goldberg
xx You, the Living

Stars indicate the most critically-acclaimed movies.

Hannah Takes the Stairs

EMAILPRINTIFC Films

Hannah Takes the Stairs reviews
63
3.2 User Score:

Generally favorable reviews

Based on 15 critic reviews
How did we calculate this?

Based on 9 votes
Read user comments
Rate this movie >

Movie Info

Genre(s): Drama

Written by: Joe Swanberg, Greta Gerwig, Kent Osborne
Andrew Bujalski, Mark Duplass
Ry Russo-Young
Kevin Bewersdorf

Directed by: Joe Swanberg

Release Date:
Theatrical: August 22, 2007
DVD: April 22, 2008

Running Time: 83 minutes, Color

Origin: USA

Summary

RATING: Not Rated

Starring Greta Gerwig, Kent Osborne, Andrew Bujalski, Ry Russo-Young, Mark Duplass, Todd Rohal, Tipper Newton, and Kris Williams

Hannah, a recent college graduate, spends a brutally hot Chicago summer falling in and out of love. As she struggles to find personal and professional fulfillment through various relationships with friends and coworkers, she risks leaving destruction in her wake. Working collaboratively with his cast, which features several prominent independent filmmakers, Joe Swanberg follows up his previous efforts, "Kissing on the Mouth" and "LOL", with this delicate look at friendship, ambition, and the pursuit of happiness. (IFC Films)

What The Critics Said

All critic scores are converted to a 100-point scale. If a critic does not indicate a score, we assign a score based on the general impression given by the text of the review. Learn more...

80

Film Threat Don R. Lewis

What really elevates Hannah Takes the Stairs is the truly outstanding performance by Greta Gerwig.

Read Full Review >
78

Austin Chronicle Marrit Ingman

The film has no script; it goes from moment to moment unhurriedly.

Read Full Review >
75

Seattle Post-Intelligencer Andy Spletzer

Though the dialogue feels improvised and honest, the movie is less honest in creating its world.

Read Full Review >
75

Chicago Tribune Sid Smith

Intimacy is graphically portrayed, down to recurring moments in a bathtub, including a memorable duet trumpet rendition of “The 1812 Overture.” Chop off a star if you’re not up for highly experimental cinema.

Read Full Review >
75

New York Post V.A. Musetto

How can a movie with such a charming cast (let's not forget Ry Russo-Young as Hannah's female roommate) and believable dialogue (seemingly taken from the actors' real lives) go wrong? It can't.

Read Full Review >
75

The Onion (A.V. Club) Noel Murray

Doesn't rise to the level of Bujalski's breakthrough feature "Mutual Appreciation," mainly because Swanberg doesn't have Bujalski's eye.

Read Full Review >
75

Boston Globe Ty Burr

Shot with intentionally banal anti-style - minimal soundtrack music, found sound, jitter-cam - the movie achieves a wisdom that's bigger than it seems.

Read Full Review >
70

LA Weekly Scott Foundas

Like most of the men in the film, we would happily follow her anywhere.

Read Full Review >
70

Los Angeles Times Carina Chocano

There's something to be said for cinema this perversely naturalistic.

Read Full Review >
67

Entertainment Weekly Owen Gleiberman

What defines the slacker-geek twentysomething men and women who wander through Joe Swanberg's too-hip-to-be-romantic comedy Hannah Takes the Stairsis that they treat their libidos as minor accessories -- only to stammer through every casual conversation as if they were on a first Internet date.

Read Full Review >
60

Salon.com Andrew O'Hehir

The film's intimacy never feels fake, it's sporadically and unpredictably funny (I didn't exactly enjoy the cacophonous trumpet duet of the "1812 Overture," but I won't soon forget it), and the nonprofessional cast is surprisingly good.

Read Full Review >
50

The New York Times Matt Zoller Seitz

Less notable for its story than for what the movie itself represents: an evolutionary entry in the so-called Do It Yourself (or D.I.Y.) independent film movement.

Read Full Review >
50

San Francisco Chronicle G. Allen Johnson

Though it has merit and is recommended for the curious and adventurous, Joe Swanberg's film wears out its welcome about halfway through its 83 minutes. I'd say it doesn't go anywhere, but that's the point of these movies.

Read Full Review >
38

TV Guide Maitland McDonagh

The loose, rambling conversations that substitute for action might be more interesting if any of the characters were capable of real introspection. But they're so shallow and distracted they can't even manage sustained navel-gazing, which makes their so-called relationships profoundly uninteresting.

Read Full Review >
30

Variety Joe Leydon

Has the unmistakable look and feel of a micro-budget indie produced for a small circle of friends, many of whom are listed in the credits.

Read Full Review >

What Our Users Said

The average user rating for this movie is 3.2 (out of 10) based on 9 User Votes

Note: User votes are NOT included in the Metascore calculation.

Peter K. gave it a0:
I thought Paris Hilton could not make movies until I saw this waste of time - now she seems like an Academy Award winner. Plotless, pointless and banal - and hand-held filming to boot - Hannah Takes the Stairs is Cloverfield without the monster. Watch the trailer and save your time.

Jay H. gave it a3:
Very low budget independent film, I suppose there is supposed to be some deep significance to the movie, but I was too bored to care about what that might be. It seemed like a home movie to me, and not an interesting one at that.

Shi T. gave it a10:
We got ourselves some angry reviewers. We put our emotions about drugs, laziness and strangely enough being white get in the way of our review! I bet they are both the same person! No one ever agrees on the internet.

Walter B gave it a1:
Joe's review says it all. It takes seven writers to write something this bland and disgustingly white? Go back to your bongs and give the camera back to Bujalski. At least he writes his garbage alone.

Joe J. gave it a0:
This film is awful and entirely unrepresentative of our generation, unless of course we are all white, wealthy and unmotivated.

Popular on CBS sites: SEC Football | NFL | Video Game Cheats | iPhone | Video Game Reviews | Notebooks | Antivirus Software

About CBS Interactive | Jobs | Advertise

© 2009 CBS Interactive Inc. All rights reserved. | Privacy Policy | Terms of Use