Born to Be Blue

Ethan Hawke as Chet Baker is giving us a characterization of Chet Baker not as the person but surely as what it felt like to be Chet Baker. It is Chet Baker trying to understand himself and how his music was a projection of himself to which he was always striving to make more perfect. No human can do this therefore the heroin was an escape from himself.

Carmen Ejogo positively shines as the two women in his life. As his girlfriend Elaine she tries to bring some sense of balance and grounding into his mixed-up life and realizes late into their loveship she will always be second to his music and drugs.

This story is fascinating and painful. And this is where the viewer may experience compassion burnout because Baker is forever making the same mistakes. He cannot see this but you the viewer will see it and by movies end you just do not care anymore. Everything about this movie is right but by the end you are just at the point of being bored!

Still this is a film worth every minute of viewing time.