Review: Nights and Weekends (2008)

Written and directed by Greta Gerwig and Joe Swanberg

Nights and Weekends (2008)
written and directed by Greta Gerwig and Joe Swanberg

This movie contains a lot of extremes. Focusing directly, and almost exclusively, on a couple and their relationship, it's the epitome of an indie film for the 2000's: miniscule budget; shot over the course of a few years; written by, directed by, and starring the same two people. And one of the most intimate films you'll ever see.

Mattie and her boyfriend James live in different cities, and their relationship isn't doing well. That's the whole premise and pretty much the whole plot. During the course of what is apparently at least three years, she goes from being a nursing student to almost unemployable; he goes from a crotchety videogames player to having a hand in a successful gaming company. They break up at the end.

That's not much of a framework on which to hang a feature film unless some aspect of the filmmaking is extraordinary. What carries the film, in this respect, is Greta Gerwig's screen presence. Her face, often in closeup, is so fluid and conveys a rush of emotion so transparently that I feel I'd have to invent multiple dimensions on which to quantify its movements. Ás an actor she seems to be in some kind of improvisational trance-flow most of the time, so that the lengthy shots are fascinating rather than static.

Another startling aspect is how much of the film the two characters are naked or having sex or both. The movie starts with them tumbling into his apartment in an embrace and making love while simultaneously tearing off each other's clothes; this is charming, funny, and passionate all at once. It also invests the viewer in the couple's happiness, a hope that is first disappointed and then choked to death as her character grows increasingly panicked and his grows increasingly distant.

In the end, it's a tragedy. Nobody dies, but it's almost as if they had.