Cate Blanchett names her favourite arthouse movies
The Australian actor Cate Blanchett is gearing up for her eighth Academy Award nomination, with Tár set to deliver yet another nod for Best Actress at the 2023 Oscars. Starring in the frenetic drama, which is set in the world of Western classical music, the Todd Field-directed movie tells the story of Lydia Tár (Blanchett), a woman widely considered to be one of the greatest living composer-conductors.
Winning the Oscar would hand the actor her third Academy Award after already being praised for her performances in the 2004 Martin Scorsese drama The Aviator and the 2013 Woody Allen flick Blue Jasmine. Amidst the rush of modern performers, it’s easy to forget the staggering consistency of Blanchett, who has impressed since the 1990s and collaborations with the likes of Stanley Kubrick, Peter Jackson, Jim Jarmusch, Wes Anderson and Alejandro G. Iñárritu.
Throughout her many years at the heights of the industry, Blanchett has developed an informed impression of cinema history, picking out some of her all-time favourites when she ventured into the Criterion closet with the Tár director Todd Field.
Selecting a number of iconic gems of world cinema, Blanchett collaborated with Field and spent a wholesome amount of time discussing some of their favourite movie moments from the films they could see around them. One of the first films they picked out was also the most recent release mentioned, taking Jacques Audiard’s Dheepan off the shelf. It’s a drama about a former soldier, a young woman and a little girl who pose as a family to escape the Sri Lankan civil war.
Unable to pick specific films from their favourite filmmakers, Blanchett and Field also picked collections from both Ingmar Bergman and Federico Fellini. The Criterion box set Ingmar Bergman’s Cinema includes such classics as The Seventh Seal, Wild Strawberries and Brink of Life. Meanwhile, the Fellini collection includes the likes of 8½, La dolce Vita and Amarcord.
Lovers of art film, many of their picks cover world cinema, including Mikhail Kalatozov’s The Cranes Are Flying, Larisa Shepitko’s The Ascent and Benjamin Christensen’s Häxan. Still, Blanchett and Field are partial to a bit of Hollywood comedy too, opting for the Sydney Pollack comedy Tootsie, starring Dustin Hoffman. Winning just Best Supporting Actress for Jessica Lange after ten nominations in total, Pollack’s iconic comedy was considered a classic of the early 1980s.
Check out all the titles that Blanchett and Field pulled from the Criterion closet below.
Cate Blanchett’s favourite Criterion movies:
- The Ascent (Larisa Shepitko, 1977)
- The Cranes Are Flying (Mikhail Kalatozov, 1957)
- Devil In A Blue Dress (Carl Franklin, 1995)
- Dheepan (Jacques Audiard, 2015)
- Essential Fellini (Federico Fellini, 1950-1987)
- Häxan (Benjamin Christensen, 1922)
- In Cold Blood (Richard Brooks, 1967)
- Ingmar Bergman’s Cinema (Ingmar Bergman, 1946-2003)
- Letter Never Sent (Mikhail Kalatozov, 1960)
- A Man Escaped (Robert Bresson, 1956)
- A Master Builder (Jonathan Demme, 2013)
- My Dinner With Andre (Louis Malle, 1981)
- My Winnipeg (Guy Maddin, 2007)
- Summer With Monika (Ingmar Bergman, 1953)
- Tootsie (Sydney Pollack, 1982)
- Wooden Crosses (Raymond Bernard, 1932)
