On its surface, the movie plunges into the downward spiral of being an alcoholic. But there is a depth of trauma that Jasmine's vice is able to expose. The poison, alcohol, is only the symptom-- a trigger-- to a woman scorned. She finds comfort in the folds of the privileges her gender (as Ginger would say, she had the "good genes.") and class give her, but the real obstacle she suffers is the plasticity of her identity. Without her husband, her sister and the people around her, she is a nobody. An empty but pretty shell.

Her beauty and elegance are illusions that attract others-- and that's all they reduce her to: a beautiful distraction. She is the trophy wife, the tasteful decorator, the charming host, the pretty receptionist, the woman at the bar you'd buy a drink for. These are exteriors conjured by others that she lives in.

Jasmine knows this, and this is why she clings to the bottle. The alcohol cannot judge her or reject her for what she is underneath all the glitter: an emptiness. It is the alcohol that triggers her "tantrums" and manic state, but it is also the alcohol that numbs the pain of knowing that nobody--not her husband or step-son or sister-- really wants anything to do with her.

In the end, everybody wants her but nobody needs her.