BLUE JASMINE

Wow, I’d read great things about Woody Allen’s latest and was psyched to see his return to form-not to mention his return to the states after nearly a decade of mostly European shoots. Which is why I felt like I must’ve stumbled into the wrong theater as I watched the sloppy, misanthropic sitcom that is Blue Jasmine. If last year’s To Rome With Love is the sorriest comedy of Allen’s career, this is his most seriously flawed serious film.

I know I’ve said it but, wow, I can’t wrap my head around the praise his 44th movie has earned. I thought maybe I’d missed something and watched it again. Nope. When’s a reviewer going to state the painfully obvious: that, at almost 80, he’s possibly reached the point where it’s time either to slow down or hang it up?

In 1999 Randy Newman recorded a song apropos for the state of the director’s career. Written in the voice of an over-the-hill rocker who doesn’t realize it’s time to get off the road, it’s called “I’m Dead” and goes:

“When will I end this bitter game?

When will I end this cruel charade?

Everything I write all sounds the same

Each record that I’m making

Sounds like a record that I made

Just not as good.”

The chorus:

“I’m dead but I don’t know it

(He’s dead. He’s dead).

Please don’t tell me so.”

It’s time someone told Allen so because he clearly doesn’t know it and the words “bitter” and “cruel” couldn’t be more applicable to this half baked riff on A Streetcar Named Desire updated for the age of Madoff. There isn’t a sympathetic character in sight. Or one remotely resembling an actual human being.

Cate Blanchett stars in the Blanche DuBois-inspired title role. A former Park Avenue power wife, Jasmine lost everything (including her mind) when her husband (Alec Baldwin) was imprisoned for financial funnybusiness and, as the film opens, finds herself in San Francisco depending on the kindness of virtual strangers-her working class sister Ginger (Sally Hawkins) and her grease monkey boyfriend (Bobby Cannavale) who’ve agreed to put her up.

There’s the germ of an intriguing idea in there-the notion of Blanche/Jasmine’s downfall as a metaphor for the country’s economic collapse-and I’m for anyone inclined to remind a 21st century audience of Tennessee Williams’ genius. The problem is Allen’s grown lazy and sour. Almost everything he does these days cynically recycles themes he explored with greater depth and elegance before.

It wasn’t even that long ago he made Match Point (2005), a drama likewise dealing with a woman on the verge and class distinctions. That was subtle, masterful filmmaking. In Blue Jasmine, however, the director revisits this territory settling for work that’s ramshackle and cartoonish. Though he’s set the tale in the Bay Area, for example, everyone with the exception of Blanchett talks like they just walked off the set of Jersey Shore.

Not much of consequence happens either: Jasmine grows bitter and chugs Stoli like it’s Perrier. The drunker and more delusional she gets, the crueler she is to her hosts. At times she’s nearly as contemptuous of these blue collar caricatures as their creator. I can’t recall a picture in which Allen displayed less empathy for his characters.

It’s like an episode of King of Queens or The Honeymooners only the schlubs never say anything funny and the snob wouldn’t know if they did because she’s too busy flashing back to parties in the Hamptons and talking to herself. All I know is Blue Jasmine is 98 minutes of meaningless tedium with delusions of cinematic significance. And all I can say is “wow.”