Blue Jasmine
Director: Woody Allen
Cast: Cate Blanchett, Sally Hawkins, Alec Baldwin
Length: 98 minutes
Country: USA
Every Woody Allen movie since Annie Hall starts the same, a Windsor font title displayed over a black background scored to jazz music. It’s his stamp as an auteur, introducing the viewer into his intensely personal view of the universe, love, and relationships. What is remarkable about Blue Jasmine, Allen’s 47th movie, is that he hasn’t run out of new things to say.
This is his most topical film since Manhattan, probing into post-recession guilt, and society’s decadent obsession with materialism. It’s clearest inspiration is A Streetcar Named Desire, with Cate Blanchett channeling the fractured spirit of Blanche DuBois in an Oscar-worthy performance. However, the material is told with such levity that the possibility for comedy is never far away. It is with this mingling of tragedy and comedy that Blue Jasmine approaches a Shakespearian dimension in the vein of Allen’s 1989 classic Crimes and Misdemeanors. But whilst Crimes and Misdemeanors is seen as a rebuttal of Macbeth, Blue Jasmine has something more King Lear-like about its ultimate fate. Jeanette French (she changed her name to Jasmine) is a tragic figure in the classic mold, completely deluded in the face of all reality. Watching her hopelessly cling on as the facade crashes down all around her is a fantastic train-wreck in slow motion.
The story begins with Jasmine on a plane telling an older woman about how she met her husband. This is the first of many times she starts talking about herself to strangers. She is on her way to visit her poor sister Ginger (Sally Hawkins), after her rich husband Hal (Alec Baldwin) has been imprisoned for fraud. Abetted by endless vodka martinis and bottles of Xanax, she determines to start a new life by enrolling in a computer course so she can qualify online as an interior decorator. This narrative is intertwined with flashbacks of her life with her husband, which is slowly shown to be predicated on deceit and lies. “I fell in love with the name Jasmine” Hal says, but Jasmine isn’t even her real name. The effect of playing the two narratives in parallel is to see how much of the old life Jasmine pretends that she still has, such as giving the taxi driver a hundred dollar tip, flying first class, and carrying Louis Vuitton bags. She can’t give those away because they have her name on them.
Jeanette French (she changed her name to Jasmine) is a tragic figure in the classic mold, completely deluded in the face of all reality
What makes the contrast so convincing is the excellent costume design by Suzy Benzinger, who dresses Blanchett in classic designer clothes such as a stunning strapless Carolina Herrera evening gown and $65,000 earrings for the New York scenes, and the same fading Chanel jacket for the majority of the San Francisco scenes. She defines herself by what she wears, therefore the loss of her clothes acts as a metaphor for the loss of her own identity, which she has built up on depending on her husband’s lies. It is noticeable that she wants to rebuild her life by becoming an interior decorator. This could be a way of trying to reclaim some of the glamour that she has lost. Most of what makes Jasmine so fascinating is what she hides from the audience, that she is trying not to let us know, and this is where the films dramatic suspense lies, as her fatal flaw is finally revealed.
Jasmine’s storyline is often undercut by that of her sister Ginger’s, who seems to live a less complex existence. Her relationship with her fiancé Chilli (Bobby Cannavale) and her lover Al (Louis C.K) offers a lighter counterpoint to the more dramatic story of Jasmine. What elevates this story from a generic fish out of water tale to a complex drama is that Ginger’s life isn’t the direct moral antithesis to Jasmine’s. Her life is equally fraught with comprised dreams. Like in all good Woody Allen films a lot of questions are asked, but he is wise enough not to suggest he knows the answers.
If you liked Blue Jasmine and want to see more Woody Allen, here is my personal top ten list.
1. Annie Hall (1977)
2. Hannah and Her Sisters (1986)
3. Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989)
4. Broadway Danny Rose (1984)
5. Everybody Says I Love You (1996)
6. Radio Days (1987)
7. Manhattan (1979)
8. Love and Death (1975)
9. Deconstructing Harry (1997)
10. Everything You Always Wanted To Know About Sex* But Were Too Afraid To Ask (1972)
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