Woody Allen (Annie Hall, Midnight in Paris) has done more than enough in his latest venture to interest me in checking out some of his past films that I have yet to see. Blue Jasmine is a terrific little movie about crushed dreams, deception, and trying your best to accept the life you have, regardless if it is the life that you want. It stars Cate Blanchett (The Aviator, Notes on a Scandal) as the title character, a woman whose life is turned completely upside down when her life of luxury is uprooted as a result of her husband Hal’s (Alec Baldwin – The Cooler, The Departed) poor personal and professional decision-making. Instead of continuing to live her posh lifestyle in New York City with (what she thought) was her perfect husband, she is forced to move in with her sister Ginger (Sally Hawkins – Happy-Go-Lucky, Submarine) and her two sons in a rundown San Francisco apartment because she has nowhere else to go. Blanchett (Best Actress), Hawkins (Best Supporting Actress), and Allen (Best Original Screenplay) were all nominated for Academy Awards. While Blanchett and Allen were most deserving, I didn’t think Hawkins was great. It furthers the argument that the award is likely a two-person race between Lupita Nyong’o (12 Years a Slave), who should win, and Jennifer Lawrence (American Hustle). Blanchett has a small chance to unseat the favorite Sandra Bullock (Gravity), but I just don’t see it happening. Bullock carried a Best Picture nominee by herself for more than an hour. Even if Blue Jasmine had been nominated for Best Picture, it would still have been hard for her to defeat Bullock.

Blanchett is an alcoholic and Xanax-addicted pill popper who is having an extremely difficult time adjusting to the reality of her new situation. She delivers the psychological free fall of the year. One minute she seems completely put together, and the next, she is a complete wreck. Sometimes it isn’t even a minute but rather just a single frame. Allen does a fantastic job of showing the emotional imbalance of this woman. The flashbacks are a huge element of this film, and plenty of them exist. Sometimes the transitions aren’t as clear as they could be. Jasmine will literally walk through the door of a scene in the present time and end up in her former life. This was by no means an accident, and it doesn’t take long to figure out it’s a flashback because we quickly see Hal. He’s a likable fellow even after we learn of his transgressions. I think part of that has to do with the fact that we don’t care much for Jasmine in the early going. She seems to think she is above everyone, including Ginger and her then-husband Augie (Andrew Dice Clay). While the pair visits for five days early in the film, Jasmine thinks of everything she can do to keep her sister busy in the city and out of her hair. She’s not a very sympathetic character (at least early in the movie). As the movie progresses, it becomes difficult for us to classify Jasmine as a character we care about or don’t care about. So, in that sense, Blanchett and Allen have both achieved something special…a complex character who we are uncertain if abrasiveness and hurtfulness are entirely her fault or more a result of her emotional condition.

While Jasmine is the movie’s central character, she is far from the only character we feel connected to. Clay is wonderful as Ginger’s first husband, a sympathetic character who gets taken advantage of by Jasmine and Hal. Likewise, we feel a strong connection to Ginger, who tries earnestly to do the right thing for all of the people she cares for in her life. It proves to be a near-impossible task, and she gets both hurt and taken advantage of throughout the film. She has relationships with three men throughout the film. These include Augie, grease man and emotional sleeve wearer Chili (Bobb Cannavale – television’s Boardwalk Empire, television’s Nurse Jackie), and Al (Louis C.K. – television’s Louie), a seemingly nice enough man who works in the electronic business. She does seem to go from man to man, though; as Jasmine points out, each one is worse than the previous. But like the other characters in the film, Ginger is just trying to find a little happiness in the world. Finally, there is the rich and driven Dwight (Peter Sarsgaard – An Education, Shattered Glass), a man who has ambitions for a political career and (too) quickly falls in love with the Jasmine she wants him to fall in love with and not the Jasmine that she truly is. I liked Sarsgaard’s performance in this movie because I’ve seen way too many movies of his recently where he plays the bad guy. He’s a talented actor, but he had been bugging me as of late with his roles. It was good to see him as a vulnerable character for a change. He was a perfect counterpart to Jasmine at exactly the right time. So while Jasmine is the movie’s focus, Allen effortlessly introduces us to many other characters, some of which are very sympathetic and some of which are not. This helps us, or maybe it doesn’t, try to figure out exactly where Jasmine fits in by the movie’s conclusion.

Blue Jasmine is Allen’s 16th Oscar nomination for Best Writing, Original Screenplay. That is 16 Oscar nominations in 35 years, by the way. That is insane when you think about it. And while Blue Jasmine has no chance of defeating American Hustle, Her, Dallas Buyer’s Club, or Nebraska in this category, it is still quite the achievement to be nominated. Blue Jasmine is the only one of these five nominees not to be nominated for Best Picture. Woody Allen fans should see this movie. This would be a perfect place to start if you are just getting into Allen. I still might recommend it if you aren’t a huge fan of his movies. I’ve only seen a handful of his films, but this is my favorite. As mentioned earlier, this movie did enough to get me to start a Woody Allen movie streak.

Plot 9/10
Character Development 8.5/10 (does Jasmine advance from beginning to end? She does, but not as much as I would have liked…again, that might have been Allen’s intention)
Character Chemistry 9.5/10
Acting 9.5/10
Screenplay 10/10
Directing  9.5/10 (Allen is the first to say he doesn’t consider himself a great director…sometimes I agree…today I did not)
Cinematography 8/10 (great shots of both New York City and San Francisco add to this)
Sound 7.5/10
Hook and Reel 9/10 (I never felt bored by this dialog-driven movie)
Universal Relevance 8.5/10 (while the specific scenario is a little extravagant for most of us, we all know that our lives can change on us in a fraction of a second)
89%

Movies You Might Like If You Liked This Movie

• Still Alice
• Nebraska
• Irrational Man
• My Happy Family
• Enough Said