Reviewed by Anne Wollenberg
Stars Tilda Swinton, Saul Rubinek, Kate Del Castillo, Aiden Gould,
Jude Ciccolella, Bruno Bichir, Horacio Garcia Rojas, Kevin Kilner | Written by Erick Zonca
UK certification 15 | UK RRP £15.99 | DVD Region 2 | Runtime 137 minutes | Directed by Erick Zonca
Sometimes a strong performance just isn’t enough to carry a film. This is one of those times. It’s hard to find blame with Tilda Swinton’s intense portrayal of Julia, an alcoholic who kidnaps her neighbour’s son in an attempt to extort money. But she’s so utterly dislikeable and unsympathetic that it’s difficult to feel anything but repulsion or contempt for the character, or her situation.
Fellow Alcoholics Anonymous member Elena (del Castillo), is afraid of losing her eight-year-old son Tom (Aidan Gould), so she asks broke, newly-fired Julia to kidnap him. Julia refuses, only to decide she’ll go ahead with the kidnapping after all – but for her own gain. To say that she lacks any maternal instinct is an understatement. And, to that you can add common sense – what kidnapper leaves her gun and mask on the bedside table, only to panic when a maid wants to clean the room?
What with Julia brandishing a gun at the young boy, swearing at him, tying him up, locking him in a car boot, drugging him... by the time she starts to soften it’s too late. You’ll already hate her, not to mention worrying about the psychological impact on the child actor involved. There are moments when Julia seems gloriously unhinged, while at other times you can actually spy a flicker of humanity, but for the most part she’s just repellant, not compelling, and the same can therefore be said for the film.
Julia’s initial cruel treatment of Tom means this isn’t simply a portrait of a goodtime girl turned bad who’s done something rash and stupid. It’s darker and deeper than that, but we never quite get under Julia’s skin. Inspired by John Cassevetes’ 1980 film Giulia, in which Gena Rowlands goes on the run with a young boy after his parents are murdered, Julia offers neither gripping drama nor heart-tugging emotion. It’s bleak and uncomfortable, and Swinton is as intense as ever, but it takes more than a saucer-eyed stare to sustain more than two hours of film.
EXTRAS ** There’s a 14-minute interview with Swinton, which is pretty interesting although it makes for slightly odd viewing as she doesn’t actually look at the camera; around 23 minutes of deleted scenes with an introduction from writer/director Zonca and co-writer Aude Py, who say they wanted to make a four-and-a-half-hour film (thank goodness they didn’t) and impart a lot of very generic (and thus boring) comments; and a trailer.