Actors: Tilda Swinton, Saul Rubinek
Director: Erick Zonca
I should explain, based on the number of 3½ star ratings I've been giving out, what that exactly means. In my view, it means a film that takes risks but doesn't quite cohere. It may have a great concept and fail to execute. Alternately, a 3½ star film may take a poor concept and execute it as good as it can be done.
Julia falls in the 'great concept, couldn't quite pull it off' realm. I'm not sure the creators of Julia realized they were making a noir film. As a result, most of the character development comes off as hollow - we're watching a rather convoluted film. When the movie tries to pull back and show us the characters' human side, it's difficult to empathize with any of the main characters. The film also runs long at 140 minutes; I doubt this could be a 90 minute film, but it could easily be a 120 minute film.
However, despite the character issues, Tilda Swinton is phenomenal as the titular character - her performance, at the very least, was quite credible.
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swinton mesmerized me in this performance. my favorite character of 2008. i also liked how much of the story was completely unpredictable. coming into the movie, i thought we were going to get some thing about a woman who is reduced to sleeping around town for cash or something, but instead we get this wild kidnapping thing that ends up in mexico? great stuff
ReplyDeleteyeah i mean the movie is pretty unbelievable - there's that scene i wanted to call a 'deus ex mexico' where julia somehow bursts through a wall into tijuana - but the concept is real great. kidnapping in films is always made to look real easy, but in julia it seems like kind of hard work to a non-sadist, non-brilliant criminal type.
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