Blue Jasmine
After experiencing a traumatic misfortune, Jasmine French, a wealthy woman from New York, moves to San Francisco to live with her foster sister Ginger and the firm purpose of getting a new life, but she will be haunted by anxiety and memories of the past.
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- Cast:
- Alec Baldwin , Cate Blanchett , Louis C.K. , Bobby Cannavale , Andrew Dice Clay , Sally Hawkins , Peter Sarsgaard
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Reviews
From my favorite movies..
The acting in this movie is really good.
There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.
This movie feels like it was made purely to piss off people who want good shows
On Woody Allen's Blue JasmineI've seen several Woody Allen films, and I've enjoyed them all. But here, he brilliantly tells a very believable story of a woman who is obviously in major distress, and attempts to come out of it. His story here doesn't crash and burn as I thought it might have, but instead the story was consistent with its main character's personality. All though she came and lived with her sister, it very well could have been a story of siblings or friendship, but instead it became something much different...something more creative. Woody Allen masterfully created a character that was flawed, but yet this character also we could feel for. Her husband had multiple affairs on her and told her that he was in love with someone else. That was something that we could inevitably have emotion for and maybe even so personal connections. As in his brilliant masterpiece Annie Hall, Allen makes a regular bunch of people come together to make a wonderful rich story. Cate Blanchett's character, Jasmine, comes from marrying rich, but her husband is found as a crook. Then she ends up living with her sister and trying to find a job and so forth. Sounds like a typical life story of someone who comes out of a marriage. But what happens here is that Wood Allen creates a character that is special, someone different from most people. She has a hard time adjusting to the new world she is in. Most people would be able to adjust. Not only this, but she starts influencing her sister as well, creating a whole new atmosphere around her. We see what she was like before the film began.The framework worked well, as it was simple just as the story. Nothing too major with the camera, except fantastic photographic images that are still in my mind now. I must say, symmetrical images in films that give such wonderful color contrast is truly a piece of art. Just as in all of Wes Anderson's work, Woody Allen creates some great flat shots, where we see color and perfect alignments with objects in the scene. When Jasmine is in the bathtub, we see flowers on either side, not perfectly symmetrical but to the extent where we get the point (also makes it more realistic), and when we walk into her and Hal's living room for the first time; a wonderful shade of dark green brought out by a beautiful brown. The colors match the scenes and make a wonderful artwork to look at.Overall this film was a great edition to the Woody Allen library and makes me want to go and re-watch Midnight in Paris to see if I notice anything I hadn't noticed before. I thought the film had complex characters set into a believable storyline and it created a fine story to want to sit down and watch.
A detailed and nuanced portrait of an extremely troubled woman that manages to have a light, comedic tone despite its dark content. Tackles a number of heavy themes like mental illness, identity, and infidelity but always in a clever, entertaining, and frequently funny way. Cate Blanchett is the blinding star of the film, giving a phenomenal performance that she certainly deserved her Oscar win for. Her range here is so broad and she captures every detail of her histrionic character in a way that feels authentic and spontaneous. The screenplay is also largely excellent with sharp dialogue and an intelligent structure which jumps between the past and present in a way that effectively peels the layers of these characters back. There are a few moments that feel a bit contrived, particularly a chance encounter Jasmine has with a former brother-in-law which was a tad too convenient for the story and felt more scripted than spontaneous. These moments are rare, however, and overall Blue Jasmine is a quality film elevated to excellence by Blanchett.4/5
They really brought out lots of delicate and rare emotions. I'm in awe of how the actors can play such parts in front of a camera and a crew.
I won't go into the reasons why I was never a Woody Allen fan; suffice it to say I went into this movie armed with the XXL tub of popcorn to hurl at the screen. With some pebbles & broken glass mixed in for good measure.98 minutes later I was ready to sing the praises of this film, and today 24 hours later I still can't get it out of my head. "Blue Jasmine" is an exceptional film, and I'm not just talking about Cate Blanchett's well-deserved-Academy-award-winning performance. More about that in a minute, but let's touch on why the story is such a worthwhile experience."Blue Jasmine" is a loose, modernized retelling of the classic "Streetcar Named Desire". Cate Blanchett does an amazing job of playing the delusional southern belle character "Blanche" this time around as a delusional Madison Avenue socialite "Jasmine" who, like Blanche, has lost everything except her stubborn insistence that she is still one of the social elite. Imagine the cast of Sex & the City with their credit cards taken away and with the job skills of a pomeranian. You can imagine how this story is the ultimate tale of irony.Where this differs significantly from the original Streetcar is in the portrayal of how Jasmine/Blanche deludes herself. Cate Blanchett's performance shows us a deeply conflicted and tortured person, as opposed to the original Blanche who had her rose colored glasses on hi-beam. In the DVD extras, Woody Allen specifically mentions that he wanted to explore this angle because that's how he believes delusion works in the real world. The deluded individual does not skip merrily through life but rather, suffers an agonizing existence caught between reality and feeble lies. This lends a very powerful authenticity to the story, once you realize that Jasmine can't even fool herself. Pay close attention to Jasmine's mannerisms as she tells her lies; she is not carefree and nonchalant. She stutters, she is evasive, twitchy and very uncomfortable. This realistic portrayal of a mentally unbalanced individual is what draws us in and creates a connection with the audience. As she slowly unravels, we are drawn in even tighter to see how it all plays out.Oh, on that note I want to issue an anti-spoiler: significant plot elements are changed from the original Streetcar, so even if you are familiar with that story you can still enjoy this as something new.If you don't know Streetcar, even better. Seeing this story for the first time will really captivate you from start to finish. All performances were excellent, and I mean excellent, with a notable nod to Sally Hawkins who plays Jasmine's loyal sister Ginger (Stella). She conveys a sense of puppy dog naïveté without seeming outright stupid. It's the perfect counterbalance to Jasmine's jaded, cynical, woman-of-the-world personality. Sally's dramatic moment near the end is one of the most powerful scenes in the film.But of course, every dramatic scene with Cate Blanchett is hands down amazing. She does an excellent job of portraying creeping madness (with hints of chemical addiction?) in a way that is absolutely over the top, but very appropriate. She is the equivalent of a mumbling bag lady, but with a Gucci bag. Don't miss this flick. Even Woody Allen haters, I guarantee you'll be very impressed.