Nothing really happens in Joe Swanberg’s new film “Hannah Takes the Stairs.” A small circle of post-collegiate Chicagoans negotiate the ambiguities of romantic engagement, talk a lot in close-ups as intimate as a pair of skintight Levi’s, and bathe frequently — with an unfussy and not particularly erotic regard for full frontal nudity. If, as “Seinfeld” creator Larry David once quipped, the TV series was supposed to be a “comedy about nothing,” it might be just as easy to dismiss “Hannah Takes the Stairs” as a solipsistic wallow in the MySpace angst of 20-something hipsters.

Instead, it’s emblematic of the freely inventive work of a new generation of American independent filmmakers. Many of them, in fact, form the cast of “Hannah,” the third feature from the Chicago-based Mr. Swanberg, which makes its premiere Wednesday at the IFC Center. The film, which stars New York playwright Greta Gerwig as the charismatic but emotionally frustrated Hannah, leads off a two-week mini-festival billed as “The New Talkies.”