Rating summary

Movie		4.0
Video		4.5
Audio		4.0
Extras		1.5
Overall		3.5

Julieta Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Martin Liebman March 27, 2017

Julieta, based on several tales in a collection of short stories by Alice Munro, is a story of suddenly arriving hope following years of despair. The latest film from acclaimed Spanish filmmaker Pedro Almodóvar (Volver, Broken Embraces), Julieta considers the human condition and psyche through adulthood, exploring the highs and lows, the sudden moments of heartbreak and the lingering pain of broken relationships. Though certainly not its director's crowning achievement -- it's difficult to continuously top a canon as well-versed and accomplished as Almodóvar's -- the film finds favor in its deliberateness and its subtleties, its ability to mix intimate characterization with overreaching theme, to find the purpose in the smaller details amidst the lager happenings. It's a well-balanced film, texturally telling and emotionally engaging, purposeful and, while not entirely novel, sincere and intimately approachable through its melodramatic center.

Julia -- young.

Julia (Emma Suárez) is a woman of much life experience who lives in Madrid and has plans of leaving the city for a life in Portugal with her boyfriend Lorenzo (Darío Grandinetti). Her plans change on a dime when she bumps into one of her estranged daughter's old friends. The friend is in a hurry, but she fills Julia in on a few details: how she looks, where she's been. Julia's relationship with her daughter has been long dormant, and it's been many years since she knew her daughter's whereabouts. The information sparks her to give up on her plans to move, staying put in hopes that her daughter will make contact in the only place she knows where her mother may be. In the meantime, Julia flashes back to her younger days (where she is portrayed by Adriana Ugarte) and explores her love life, her daughter's conception, and their years together until the relationship fell apart.

Julieta is a film about life: love, loss, and the struggle to understand, come to terms, and move on back up from every valley and know that a tumble usually comes with the next peak. Sometimes the climb back up is short, sometimes the fall down is long. None of it comes easy, and time doesn't necessarily heal all wounds. But a moment can reopen even the deepest, oldest, most reclusive scar, for better or for worse. The film follows a woman's journey through adulthood, told primarily in flashback, when a sudden, out-of-the-blue bit of news reshapes her entire life. As it shapes the events leading up to that news, it explores -- gently at times, forcefully at others -- life's permutations through a collection of moments that build upon one another and demonstrate how her life's journey brought her to where she is as the film begins, a woman putting on a positive front but still haunted by loss. It's not exactly earth-shaking material and Almodóvar doesn't have much of anything new to say about the human condition, but it's in how he tells the story, emotionally and visually alike, that propels the film to success.

Almodóvar uses color -- reds and blues, primarily -- as critical thematic accents and reminders that reinforce character mood throughout the film, the blues, obviously, associated with lighter and cheerful moments and the red heavier and darker moments. The coloring is certainly not subtle. The structure is obvious, the purpose clear, but Almodóvar ensures that it's never the focus, finding a way to make the colors both obviously complimentary of a scene or sequence while giving way to the central characterization and plot characteristics of any given moment. The performances are exceptional, too, with Emma Suárez and Adriana Ugarte sharing the responsibility of portraying the film's protagonist along its lengthy timeframe. The performances are seamless; never does the title character feel displaced by the dueling actresses, and in fact they're so seamless at together presenting the character in a unified front that many in the audience may not even realize that two are one, even with the age discrepancy, even in a moment of clear transition. It's excellent stuff and demonstrative of the power of both performance and elegant character writing to so seamlessly transition between timeframes and performers. Support cast is terrific, too, and the end result is a gorgeously made picture that makes up for a lack of dramatic novelty with plenty of honest dramatic resonance.

Julieta Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

Julieta was digitally photographed. Sony's 1080p presentation is quite good, with a strong, deeply saturated color palette its defining characteristic. As noted above, color plays an important role in the movie. Heavy, robust, and ever-present shades of blue and red are commonplace, not often together but frequently appearing in large quantities on clothes, painted surfaces, or accents and adornments. Reds are particularly showy with contrast dialed fairly hot and pushing hard. Blues are cooler and more welcoming, equally well saturated but not tipping the scales far beyond neutral. Supportive colors shine, though faces tend to show a little red push as well. Detailing is excellent. Image clarity is strong -- there's not a soft or smudgy spot in the film -- and textural details are many. Sweaters and heavier clothes are particularly attractive while complex city environments and assorted odds and ends throughout any number of interiors -- whether a tight train car or an apartment home -- are sharp and pleasing. Black levels are deep and lifelike. Light, sporadic noise is evident, but the transfer is otherwise free of serious blemish. This is a very good new release presentation from Sony.

Julieta Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

Julieta's character-driven dramatic roots show in its Spanish language DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 lossless soundtrack. Hardly a whiz-bang, pull-no-punches extravaganza, the film's needs are rather limited, but what's here is handled with great care and attention to detail. Musical delivery is excellent, with the variety of score (from brassy Jazz to strings) playing with pleasantly wide spacing along the front and light, never intrusive wrap into the back. Clarity is terrific, with each instrumental detail obvious, and the spacing comes organically and pleasingly. City din is well defined in both the foreground and the background, lightly enveloping the listening audience in some nicely realistic beats in various exteriors. Country atmospherics are likewise filling and true. Heavy rain and rolling thunder dominate a scene in chapter nine, the most fundamentally aggressive bit of sound in the movie. Dialogue dominates, however, and it's always clear, detailed, and well prioritized with natural front-center positioning.

Julieta Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

Julieta contains two featurettes and the film's trailer.

• Portrait of Julieta (1080p, 8:51): An exploration of story and themes, project origins, characters, and the dual lead performances, with some interesting on-set footage edited in. In both English and Spanish, subtitled.
• Celebrating Director Pedro Almodóvar (1080p, 8:15): The Museum of Modern Art screens all 20 of the director's films, and a number of celebrities talk up the filmmaker. Almodóvar himself addresses his audience afterwards, as does Rossy de Palma. In English.
• Theatrical Trailer (1080p, 1:52).
• Previews (1080p): Additional Sony titles.

Julieta Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

Julieta may not be Pedro Almodóvar at his finest, but this is a well made film with excellent visual thematic reinforcement and dual highlight performances in the lead. It offers little, if anything, new in terms of character analysis, but it's a well-done reflection of humanity as it traverses the adult life of its lead character, the peaks and valleys that define her along the way. It's both methodical and quickly moving, a testament to its dramatic resonance and Almodóvar's craftsmanship. Sony's Blu-ray offers excellent video and audio along with a couple of supplements. Recommended.