Cate Blanchett Admits Having Intimate Relationships with Many Women

Cate Blanchett stars with Rooney Mara in an adaption of Patricia Highsmith’s novel The Price of Salt in which the actresses will play lovers and Blanchett represents the movie as a female oriented movie rather than making a statement about homosexuality.

Cate Blanchett is indeed a big name in Hollywood despite being an Australian actress of 45, she has acted in some iconic roles such as that of Queen Elizabeth in Elizabeth and has won two Oscars for The Aviator and The Blue Jasmine in 2004 and 2013 respectively.

Having finalized the script for Carol 15 years ago, the film was put in store to be released at a later time. The hibernating project has finally been brought out to be featured in the Cannes Film Festival in which Blanchett will be playing the role of Carol, a woman who enters into a romance with a department store clerk played by Mara.

Blanchett assures that the movie is not extremely graphic but does contain intimacy. Whilst the world still recovers from The Brokeback Mountain in which Heath Ledger and Jake Gyllenhall played closeted gay lovers, it can be safely said that the movie is not the first of its kind.

According to Blanchett in an interview with Variety, it was a challenge though to make the film. It is hard for a film like Carol to be financed easily in Hollywood. With so much focus on male-oriented movies, it is hard for financers to back a movie with two female characters in front.

She says that the reason for that remain that financers are generally under the misconception that the general audience will not be interested in such a movie and thus it would be a loss. Carol has been tested on audience and the response has been positive so she is hoping that the movie will be a way to get rid of that misconception.

Steven Chee for Variety

The film was financed by Film4 and Goldcrest Films, and was filmed in a Cincinnati outfitted to look like 1950s New York, wrapped in only 35 days in April 2014.  Blanchett is hopeful that after the movie is released, misconceptions about female centered movies will be removed to make a statement that empowers the role of women in the industry. 

Citing powerful female figures like Meryl Streep, Reese Witherspoon, Nicole Kidman, and Cinderella director Allison Shearmur, she says that women have achieved a certain level in the industry and though it is a topic not mostly discussed by many but it needs to be talked about that how women can take and change the face of the industry.

She also hopes that the movie will make people more accepting of homosexuality in general. Somehow people can tolerate gay and lesbian couples on daily TV but seem ignorant to it on the big screen. Cate hopes that with strong story like these, they can make a great difference. If the movie is successful after its screening on Mat 17th at Cannes Film Festival, rumors are already flying that she will be up for her 7th nomination at the Oscars next year.