You're Gonna Miss Me When I'm Gone: Blue Jasmine and Side Effects (Motifs in Cinema 2013: Economics and Money)

This is the long-awaited final entry into my series about money, and also my entry into Encore's World of TV and Film's blogathon "Motifs in Cinema", where I've obviously chosen the "Economics and Money" motif. Here's a little more info here: Motifs in Cinema is a discourse across film blogs, assessing the way in which various thematic elements have been used in the 2013 cinematic landscape. How does a common theme vary in use from a comedy to a drama? Are filmmakers working from a similar canvas when they assess the issue of death or the dynamics of revenge? Like most things, a film begins with an idea – Motifs in Cinema assesses how various themes emanating from a single idea change when utilized by varying artists.

Also in the series about money: We Might Be Hollow, But We're Brave: Spring Breakers and The Bling Ring (young girls and money) and Baby, You're a Rich Man: The Wolf of Wall Street and Pain & Gain (men and money). And for those wondering why I haven't/am not going to cover The Great Gatsby in this 'series', unbelievably I've had enough of incessantly making a case for talking about it and that's all about old money and stuff so yeah. There's a bit of spoilerage here for Side Effects, but y'all should have seen it by now.

I'm a big "past" person - always looking back at things and internally crying that they are no more. Alas, I don't think I have such a problem with the past as Jasmine French does in Blue Jasmine and Emily Taylor in Side Effects. Why? They used to have money. And they miss it now it's gone.

We Might Be Hollow, But We're Brave: Spring Breakers and The Bling Ring (and Lorde)

But every song's like: Gold teeth, Grey Goose, Tripping in the bathroom, Bloodstains, Ball gowns, Trashing the hotel roomWe don't care, we're driving Cadillacs in our dreams
But everybody's like: Crystal, Maybach, Diamonds on your timepiece, Jet planes, Islands, Tigers on a gold leashWe don't care, we aren't caught up in your love affair

Why the hook from Lorde's uber-phenomenonal song, Royals? It isn't just that I'm madly in love with the girl who makes me feel largely inadequate as someone in a school year ahead of her (damn you talent god for not making me musical), but because Royals became somewhat of an anthem for the NZ teenager, and somehow the rest of the world caught on. I mean, last week (or last year, whatever), I bought a copy of Vogue Magazine, purely because it had Jessica Chastain on the cover, and I was confused by how there were 65 pages of advertisements before the actual magazine started, and one of the options for a Christmas gift were $490 place-card name holders. Like, it was a big deal that I spent $25 on buying my Mum The Heat for Christmas. But hey, this is a reality for some people - and that reality is something that has been touched upon by many films in 2013 that I've unofficially called the "Look at My Shit New Wave". Falling under the umbrella of this slice of history that we'll no doubt be studying in a few years is The Wolf of Wall Street, Side Effects, Blue Jasmine, Pain & Gain, The Great Gatsby and The Bling Ring and Spring Breakers, which I'll be focusing on in this post. I'm told that films like American Hustle and The Counselor could fall under this umbrella, but I haven't had a chance to see them yet.

It is kinda funny how Lorde's music became big in 2013, defining teenagerdom, when we had The Bling Ring and Spring Breakers to define teenagerdom in film (bar The Spectacular Now, which paints a different, if equally true picture). The funny thing is that several songs off Lorde's album, particularly 'White Teeth Teens' and 'Tennis Court' wouldn't be out of place if they were to headline the soundtracks of those two films. They both depict the obsessive nature of teenagers, and how they dream of projecting a better life filled with diamonds on their timepieces and tigers on gold leashes. However, where The Bling Ring has already privileged teens wanting more, Spring Breakers has empty teenagers left broke and bored by their studies trying to achieve the kind of life the kids of The Bling Ring already have.