A cable car named despair

Blue Jasmine

Crit

I never saw Cate Blanchett's acclaimed performance in A Streetcar Named Desire, but I never doubted she could be a devastating Blanche DuBois, and if I had ever doubted it, I'd have dismissed that doubt this evening. But who could ever have imagined that 98 minutes in her company could be so excruciating? Another thing I've never seen is Woody Allen's most Bergmanesque film, Interiors, but it's hard to imagine its being any more unremittingly grim than this. Wait, I take that back: the grimness does occasionally remit here--but it is so plainly in remission that the metastatic recurrence is inevitable, making the seeming lightness all the more brutal.

The acting is remarkable across the board; we already knew what to expect from the likes of Blanchett, Alec Baldwin, Sally Hawkins, and Bobby Cannavale, but who ever expected to be so moved by Andrew Dice Clay?

An amazing film, and the Woody Renaissance continues.

Trailers

• Salinger--The long-awaited documentary; I'm open to it, but the trailer suggested a bit too much intent to find some REALLY INCREDIBLE SECRET.
• Prisoners--Another children-in-peril drama, seemingly convoluted.