Woody Allen's "Blue Jasmine' (1st review)

Having viewed almost all his films, I always thought I knew where Woody Allen stood on the subject of women— namely, that he admires them and is fascinated by them, more than any other contemporary filmmaker, with the exception of Pedro Almodovar.

But now along comes his 45th film, Blue Jasmine"“ in which I find the treatment of his female protagonist dispassionate, disturbing and downright baffling.

Jasmine French, the protagonist of this devastating film, is a survivor of a traumatic life wreckage. Her husband, Hal (Alec Baldwin), is a Bernard Madoff clone who has been convicted and imprisoned for massive investment fraud. Jasmine has lost her Park Avenue apartment, her Hamptons home, her mountain retreat, her furs, her jewels"“ everything except the contents of her three suitcases ("Louis Vuitton!" she exclaims, as she admonishes the cab driver who deposits her on her sister's doorstep).

Her son refuses to speak to her; her friends have turned their backs on her, and she's suffered a complete breakdown. She is, in short, penniless and homeless.

The refuge that awaits Jasmine in San Francisco is a far cry from her former life. Her younger sister Ginger (Sally Hawkins) lives in a cramped, untidy apartment that she shares with her pre-teen sons and her new boyfriend, Chili (Bobby Cannavale).

Sibling resentment

Ginger resents her beautiful older sister Jasmine, who convinced her and her former husband to invest all their money in Hal's Ponzi scheme. Like her sister, Ginger was left penniless and is trying to put her life back together, too. Still, the goodhearted Ginger offers Jasmine asylum "“ after all, her sister has nowhere else to go.

In a series of flashbacks, the whole sordid story is revealed"“ Jasmine's lifestyle of outrageous wealth and privilege, Hal's many extramarital affairs, the family crisis when their world (both financial and personal) came tumbling down. These scenes alternate with Jasmine's present in San Francisco, as we watch her struggle to forge a new life.

She finds a job as a dentist's secretary, takes a computer course, falls in love with a State Department official. All these efforts end in disaster, and Jasmine sinks deeper and deeper into the abyss.

Homage to Streetcar

Blue Jasmine appears to have been inspired by Tennessee Williams's masterpiece, A Streetcar Named Desire. Indeed, I was startled by how closely Allen's Jasmine resembles Williams's Blanche DuBois.

Like Blanche, who took refuge with her sister Stella, Jasmine is fleeing from a past of humiliation and takes refuge with her sister Ginger. Like Blanche, Jasmine is both sexually hungry and emotionally needy, as well as threatened by the presence of Chili, Ginger's boyfriend— a stand-in for Williams's Stanley Kowalski (You can almost hear Chili calling out: "Stella!")

Like Blanche's sister Stella, Ginger has the capacity to enjoy the quotidian life and its basic pleasures— in contrast to Jasmine, who, like Blanche, lives in a fantasy world.

Descent into madness

This similarity between Streetcar and Jasmine is reinforced by the astonishing performance of the Australian actress Cate Blanchett, who played Blanche in the Sydney Theatre Company's production of Streetcar that performed at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 2009. Blanchett's Blanche was brilliant"“ vulnerable, unstable, dangerously unpredictable, perilously fragile. Now, in Blue Jasmine, Blanchett brings these same qualities to the title role.

But Woody Allen's camera follows Blanchett's descent into madness with a clinical coldness that I've never seen before in his films. I've watched Judy Davis and Kirstie Allen flip out in Deconstructing Harry; I've watched Davis unravel again in Celebrity; I've watched Mia Farrow fall apart in Hannah and Her Sisters; I've watched Radha Mitchell crash in Melinda Melinda.

These are only a few of the many female protagonists who suffer close-up meltdowns before Allen's camera. But I've never seen a Woody Allen character disintegrate before our very eyes with the blinding intensity of Cate Blanchett's Jasmine.

Bergman's detachment

Yes, her performance is stunning, breathtaking, unforgettable. But Allen's utter lack of compassion for Jasmine seems alien and un-Allen-like to me. Indeed, Allen's detachment from Jasmine's journey reminds me of Ingmar Bergman's detachment from Liv Ullmann as she falls apart in Cries and Whispers.

Like Ullmann's demise, Jasmine's is too agonizing to watch. Why do these filmmakers make these films? How can they put their actresses through it? I wonder. Are they fascinated by watching women in pain? For me, their intense scrutiny borders on cruelty.

Allen has often referred to Bergman as his inspiration, his artistic mentor. But in Allen's films, there is always the leavening ingredient of humor or irony added, to soften the sharpest blow. That's why, in my view, his films are so rich, so profound, so human.

Amoral universe

So what is Woody Allen doing in Blue Jasmine? Is he punishing his protagonist for her corrupt values? For her addiction to Chanel suits, to Hermes bags, to credit cards"“ for her moral blindness? If so, this would appear to be a departure for Allen.

Typically, Allen's more serious films depict an indifferent, amoral universe, wherein characters literally get away with murder"“ like the ophthalmologist in Crimes and Misdemeanors or the businessman in Cassandra's Dream"“ while the innocent and the morally just (like the rabbi in Crimes and Misdemeanors) suffer.

Stumbling out into the night after 100 agonizing minutes, I tried in vain to place Blue Jasmine in Woody Allen's prodigious oeuvre. It's darker than September, Interiors or Another Woman, bleaker than Match Point, unrelenting and unforgiving. Allen is now 77. Has his worldview changed so late in the game? If so, why?♦


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