Born to Be Blue

Jazz trumpeter Chet Baker (Ethan Hawke) gains early fame for his West Coast Swing. Miles Davis dismisses him as White Men's Hope. Drug addiction breaks up his marriage to Elaine (Carmen Ejogo). Years later, he is struggling. He meets actress Jane (Carmen Ejogo) who is playing Elaine in his movie. His drug dealer smashes his face for not paying. He loses the movie and his ability to play. Even his producer friend Dick Bock (Callum Keith Rennie) has had enough. With Jane's help, he lives in a van and slowly regains his trumpet playing.

The flow is idiosyncratic like jazz. I also would like more of his early drug addiction downfall. There are some good character work from Ethan Hawke. There isn't a overriding drama but it has good some personal moments. This is solid work from Hawke but the movie is a bit slow as a whole.

Ethan Hawke stars in this beautifully acted portrayal of jazz trumpeter and singer Chet Baker during his prime. Know that the film treats the facts of Baker's actual biography, as one reviewer said, more like a chord chart than a score and riffs from there. What is true-to-life is that Baker was an only child, born on a lonely ranch in Yale, Oklahoma, and went on to have numerous relationships with women and a long-term relationship with heroin. Musically, he was a progenitor of West Coast Swing, but always had his eye on the New York scene, with the mantra: "Look out Dizzy, look out, Miles. There's a little white California boy coming for you." An accident when Baker was 12 caused him to lose a front tooth, after which he had to re-learn to play the trumpet. That was a mere warmup to the effort he had to put in after his drug dealer pistol-whipped him and knocked out all of his front teeth, destroying his embouchure. Yet, he couldn't stay away from heroin. He thought it made his playing better, and he was all about his music. While Baker had a great talent for improvisation and sustaining a melodic line, he had no talent at all for being happy. After one important comeback milestone, his manager (Callum Keith Rennie) asks, "Would you try to be happy for more than ten seconds?" This line provides the ironic overlay to the choice of title for the film, one of Baker's big hits. Hawke did the films vocals; the trumpet playing was by Canadian trumpeter Kevin Turcotte. Written and directed by Robert Budreau, the movie has an opening scene that shows how a girl he picked up after a performance casually introduced him to heroin, and he didn't say no. This scene turns out to be part of a movie being made about him and whether such a significant life event happened in such an offhand way, we don't know. The insertion of black and white scenes, some of which may be from the movie (which was never finished) or from his memory, plays with the order of events, especially early in the film, an improvisational approach to history that mimics jazz music itself. Although Baker does get clean for a several years as he is recovering his playing ability, a return to heroin remains a risk in the music business. As his parole officer says, "You go into a barber shop and sit in the chair long enough, you're going to get a haircut." Still, his parole officer, his girlfriend—the delectable Carmen Ejogo (playing a composite of several women)—his manager, and many musicians wanted him to succeed, including Dizzie Gillespie and Gerry Mulligan. Miles Davis, notoriously prickly, was not a fan, and we'll get a chance to get his side of the story in the biopic with Don Cheadle, coming soon.

This movie is a fictional reconstruction of a short period in the life of Baker, during the 60s. Starting with Chet in an Italian jail in 1966, the story quickly moves to New York, where Chet is invited to play himself in a documentary about his life. Then follows one of the most amazing scenes I ever saw.

Opening as a black & white flashback, we see a young Chet in 1954, playing very cool in Birdland, with Miles Davis and Dizzie Gillespie in the audience. In the backstage we see what should be Baker's initiation to heroin, but we discover that the scene is actually part of the documentary.

Brilliant film-making is made of such scenes conveying all the magic of cinema.

The story continues with Chet trying to rebuild his "career" with a help of a female artist, unfortunate enough to be attracted by his relatively good looks and melancholic charm. The pair moves from New York to California, where Chet swear to be clean and ready to play some serious jazz.

Unfortunately, Chet was the master of all junkies, unreliable, selfish and self-destructive. His girlfriend wisely dumps him and off he goes to enjoy the company of heroin until the day he died.

I am not a jazz fan and never heard any of the music Baker played, so I cannot comment about the remarks about the music not being good enough or even detrimental to the movie. For me it was a very well written and executed film, with a solid plot and good performances.

PS: as far as "blackening the reputation" of Baker... I never understood why junkie musicians should be idolized. The history of contemporary music is paved with unpleasant, self-destructive characters who had exceptional musical skills. Egotism does not make them any less talented, but certainly does not add to their charm.

If you want to see what years of heroin addiction do to the body, just check the photos of Chet from his early 20s until the end of his life. The crevasses on his face mirrors the destruction of his internal organs....

The overall production was stellar.

Ethan Hawke gives a honest performance that showcase his most endearing qualities as a fine thespian. His portrait of Chet Baker is impressive.

Hawke and Cameron Ejogo who played his girlfriend in the film had a lot of chemistry between the two of them, which is good because the movie centers on the both of them greatly. I herd her role is more of a mixture of many women Chet seem to be able to pull down, which only makes her performance more important, as she goes from being a coworker in a movie about his life to his love interest, the mother of his child, and most importantly the muse the keeps him going and inspires him to kick his drug habit in order to get better and play better.

The imagery of the film was great, it was not too colorful but gave a bright California vibe known in 1960s movies.

And it was a well told story about about drug addiction. It was not one of these things where you should feel super sad for the person cause he can't stay off the stuff. It was a honest look about an insure man who could not function properly without heroin in his system.

Truly a masterpiece in cinema when you can tell a fantastic and interesting story in a motion picture that does not to use Hollywood clichés in it. I loved it.

It took me two tries to get through this movie. The first try only lasted 22 minutes. It didn't connect. The second try made me go back to the beginning after resuming. Over the last few months, I've watched a fair amount of Ethan Hawke. Mostly from watching movies because I wanted to see other actors. He has certainly gained an edge. But I think the real star was Carmen Ejogo. She carries the movie and provides the humanity to the story. I'll look for her in future watches. Watch this movie.