Actress Spotlight: Cate Blanchett

Is she headed for a third Oscar?

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Oct 28, 2022

One of our most accomplished actors is likely on her way to even more accolades. With Cate Blanchett’s exceptional performance in Tar, the psychological drama about a famous (and fictional) conductor and composer on the precipice of her downfall, she anchors a film that will certainly get people talking, both about what the filmmaker Todd Field is saying and Blanchett’s work as the titular Lydia Tar.

We’re thrilled whenever Blanchett appears in a movie because that means the bar is getting raised, regardless of whether it’s a period drama, comic book fare, or anything in between. She’s easily one of our most transformational and masterful performers. We’ve written about a couple of our favorite performances of hers below, as well as our brief thoughts on Tar. Read, subscribe, and share DYLA!

Billy recommends…

Nightmare Alley

Cate Blanchett has one of the most naturally sensual voices today. A modern example of a screen siren and Nightmare Alley leans into that aspect of her so perfectly. She beautifully becomes a puppet master pulling the strings of the male hubris.

This Guillermo del Toro-directed noir came out at the worst possible time during the pandemic. A vehicle for our best stars that aren’t quite A-listers, but deserve the spotlight that they sometimes lack. Bradley Cooper, Rooney Mara, and Cate Blanchett star. Cooper plays a mysterious drifter smitten by this carnie lifestyle and Mara is smitten by this new presence. They develop an original show together that is gaining traction and their tour creates a collision course with Cate Blanchett. She is a psychiatrist with intentions that entice our main character, but while he tries to gain control we, the audience, realize he never really had it all along.

Blanchett, like in Nightmare Alley, is so masterful at pulling the strings in seemingly every aspect of her career. No wasted role. She knows when to be a blockbuster star and when to lend her talents to auteur projects. The common thread being her screen siren presence that invades all of her roles, but never fully embraced like it is in Nightmare Alley.

Streaming on Hulu and HBO Max

Drew recommends…

Carol

“What a strange girl you are… flung out of space.” Carol Aird, a glamorous and wealthy older woman, regards Therese Belivet, a young and uncertain photographer, with fascination and attraction on their first “date.” I use that word in scare quotes because Carol is set in the early 1950s when such feelings were illicit and forbidden. To get a romantic drama like this right, you need fully realized characters and actors that will be up for the challenge. Carol is nothing less than an acting clinic from its two leads, Cate Blanchett (Carol) and Rooney Mara (Therese). It’s possibly Blanchett’s best performance in a career full of outstanding work.

Their performances are enhanced by the film’s other gorgeous elements, including the dreamy cinematography and the lovely, melancholy score. Directed by Todd Haynes and adapted from a Patricia Highsmith novel, Carol is one of those remarkable films that elicits a specific feeling that only the most accomplished love stories can pull off. It doesn’t hurt that much of the story is set during the Christmas season either.

Carol is shopping at a department store for a Christmas gift for her daughter when she meets Therese, who works there. They have a pleasant exchange and then Carol leaves her gloves on the counter, almost certainly on purpose so they can meet again. This scene drops us into the lives of these two women, so fully realized both on the page and in the performances. Carol is going through a divorce to her husband Harge (Kyle Chandler) and Therese is deciding whether she should marry her boyfriend Richard. Carol is outwardly confident and self-assured, Therese is hesitant and soft-spoken, but the connection they share is strong.

Blanchett has appeared as similarly smart, graceful, and strong-willed women before, but playing opposite Mara’s Therese gives her character a counterpoint that is cinematic gold. Both Blanchett and Mara have finely calibrated their performances and internalized Carol and Therese as characters. Because their love is forbidden, so much is communicated with their eyes and body language – an attentive gaze, a fleeting glance, a hand brushing a shoulder. What might seem innocuous to an outside observer is life-altering for the characters, and due to the talent in front and behind the camera we can feel every inch of that in Carol.

Available to rent from digital platforms

From the DYLA Archive

The Talented Mr. Ripley

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

Thor: Ragnarok

Hanna

Tar mini-reviews

Billy: I know Todd Field from his role as our first glimpse into this secret world in Eyes Wide Shut. As a tornado chaser in Twister. And as the inventor of Big League Chew. Not the movies he has directed. This is Field’s third feature and his first in 16 years. I’m glad I didn’t have an expectation of his previous films because his long hiatus created enough hype. Especially when he is coming back with a movie starring our greatest living actress. Cate Blanchett is never not in a scene. She plays Lydia Tar, a renowned music conductor. A figure in an established traditional world that can be resistant to the change happening around them. A unique world to throw our current issues on to and that choice made me more open to ideas that otherwise I may have rolled my eyes at. Blanchett and Field blew me away. - 4.5 / 5 Apples

Drew: It’s so rare to see a film that treats explosive contemporary issues with nuance and complexity. Tar is slippery and maybe a bit too cold to the touch, but it’s a thought-provoking exploration of artistic genius, cancel culture, and power dynamics. Lydia Tar is no easy hero or villain. Todd Field’s direction is immaculate and you can’t say enough superlatives about Cate Blanchett in this movie. She’s that elite. - 4.5 / 5 Apples

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