Julie Johnson (2001)

The Worst Film Ever

Sick Product of a Sick System

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

Julie Johnson is a harried, blue-collar housewife, living in New Jersey with her husband and children. Julie's bored and overwhelmed, but she has an intense interest in science. She subscribes to science mags, which she keeps hidden from her narrow-minded, domineering husband. Seems that he just can't fathom Julie's interest, in computers and science.One day, Julie decides that she wants to take the High school Equivilency Exam, so that she can receive her High school diploma. Meanwhile, she also decides to enroll in computer courses at the local community college. Julie even encourages her best friend Claire, to enroll in the computer courses with her. Claire does so mainly to appease Julie, rather than out of any real interest in computers.Julie's instructors discover that she has an innate talent for math and science. So much so, that they encourage Julie to apply to some elite colleges, after she passes her High school Equivalency Exam. Julie's Neanderthal husband, forbids Julie to enroll in school. She enrolls anyhow, without telling him. After he finds out, he goes ballistic. So does Julie, who boots him out of their home, during a ferocious argument between them.Inspired by Julie's boldness when she dumps her caveman hubby, Claire runs away from her own stifling spouse. With no other place to go, she winds-up living with Julie and her kids. Claire and Julie gradually deepen their friendship, which evolves into a romantic relationship. The two consummate their romance in Julie's bed one night. Their lesbian relationship, causes Julie and Claire problems with their judgmental neighbors, friends, and Julie's disapproving children. Claire and Julie have many ups and downs in their relationship. Julie seems to have more invested in it than Claire does. Julie urges Claire to become educated, and Claire resents Julie's insistence that she upgrade her status in society. Claire feels that Julie is just too intellectual, to understand her point of view. The two must decide if their differences can be bridged, in order to salvage their relationship.Though this film is progressive, in that it depicts a mature lesbian romance between two women, much about the plot-line is rather anachronistic. First of all, though it's 2001, Julie and Claire's spouses act like it's the 1950s. Back then, men could still rule over their wives and kids. It's utterly absurd, that Julie feels the need to hide her science magazines from her husband, like a daughter would hide dirty magazines from her father. Also, if Julie was so gifted in math and science, why didn't her teachers encourage her when she was still a young student? And why did Julie have to feel so ashamed of being a woman with intellectual interests, in this day and age? These are a few of the things about the overall plot premise, that just don't ad up.The chemistry between Lili Taylor as Julie, and Courtney Love as Claire, is erotically charged from the get-go. Though she's reluctant initially to have a sexual relationship with Julie, Claire admits to having had the hots for Julie when they were teenagers. Their lovemaking sessions together, are sensual and romantic. Julie and Claire both enjoy their sexual trysts. But their relationship is also bogged-down with guilt, and internalized homophobia.The best thing about this film, is the spunkiness of Julie. She's determined to pursue her educational goal and lesbian love affair, despite the resistance of those around her. The question is, why did the creators make a movie that is so obviously out-of-step with contemporary society, regarding it's attitudes towards lesbianism, and female empowerment?? If this movie had been made before 1970, it would've been cutting-edge. By today's standards, this film comes off as being very 'dated', regarding lesbians, and women in general.

Very realistic if you see the film. In terms of premise, you wonder how "realistic" applies to a happily married heterosexual mother of two in New Jersey without a GED who winds up making love to her best female friend and realizes that she is a mathematical genius alone but strong at the end of the film.But it does work, because these people are real, at least for two hours or so, and we can feel that in Lilli and Courtney's acting there isn't a con; after a heterosexual friendship leads to characters making love, there are more than enough hints that this is happening in the real world. For instance: Neither woman, upon leaving their spouses, knows how to balance a checkbook, because they were never taught to, rather Juile (Taylor's) son, helps them because he just learned it in school. And perhaps more importantly, the characters don't see each other as villains or heroes or plot devices. These characters have known each other for a long time, and will continue to do so. Julie's husband is loving if blind to her needs, while Love's character's boyfriend really just sees her for sex. When each woman realizes they are love with one another, it isn't treated like the sex scene from "Bound": they are, after finding out about their love, scarred of this leap, but true -- and here's the key -- to their characters -- the women make love in a brief scene that's more about tenderness between them than getting any sort of reaction out of an audience. Inbetween the growth and eventual disintegration of their relationship, each scene matters because it cares about the characters. Even Julie's last moment with her husband is taken with the same form of tenderness between former lovers and friends.Julie isn't a genius overnight, either. It was latent, just like her homosexuality (or bisexuality or whatever you want to call it) -- she read books, educated herself by watching scientific based programs on t.v., etc. and grew up denying her own intelligence because she didn't believe she had it. The story is essentially Juile's: a closed off woman from the world at large who grows to believe in herself. If you complain the ending is ambiguous ... well, isn't life?

I wasn't sure what to expect from this movie about a possible lesbian love affair with a best friend, but I was pleased with its subtlety and positive turnaround ending.Julie Johnson is a middle-aged housewife with two kids and a husband who's a policeman by day, sports-fanatic by night. After years of living a redundant life with her husband making her decisions about what she can and can't do, she takes a leap of hope to jump-start her interests into a career but, more than anything, to take control of her life for a change and learn more about herself and her surroundings. Through these changes, she takes more and more chances, pushing her lust for a newfound way of life through her best friend, Claire, and transforming her interests to include a deep love for Claire herself. Now she must decide what to do with her friends, her New York surroundings, her children, her husband, her love for science, and her future with a woman who may not choose to live this way with Julie forever.I thought the entire film flowed very well, and it really highlighted the main points in Julie's life that she wished to change along the way. It shows a different view on homosexual (and generally modern) relationships and the struggles for individual desires after years of suppressing them into secrets only. It showed the problems that can arise by having a "lesbian" for a mother out of such a previous relationship with a man in the home for his children, but it didn't state clearly by the end whether or not Julie necessarily had a preference for one gender or the other, which, IMO, helped the film see that Julie's only true wish was to be genuinely loved and trusted that she'll do what's right and good for her life.I didn't necessarily think that Courtney Love should've been the love interest (especially because they gave her pretty weak lines and hardly any real direction), and I think you just have to be a fan of hers for who she is more than her abilities as an actress. I thought the subtle score (and possibly songs) by Angelo Badalamenti were a nice touch, but I would've loved to hear more of the bombast quality of his previous works for David Lynch movies in this film.. I also didn't like how the children were written into the script, and often "switched sides" from the son liking his mother Julie's decisions initially and then flip-flopping back and forth (same with the daughter), but I could see how that might be that tumultuous of a time for them to settle on one side or the other.Wrapping it up, I gave it 6/10 stars. It was easily more than an average venture into an alternative lifestyle movie, but it could've used more of the style from the director or composer to boost more of a steadfast quality into Julie to attain her dreams. Go check it out if you want to be exposed to a different way of being, and get yourself some tips about life decisions like these from this film.

While there are some genuine moments between the characters portrayed by Lili Taylor and Courtney Love, the film as a whole is an unbelievable clunker that rings terribly false. The previously unrecognized scientific talent of the Taylor character is an unnecessary plot device; the story would be much more interesting if she was an average working-class woman seeking to continue her education. The characters, especially her husband, are portrayed as two-dimensional cliches. With a more talented director at the helm, this film might have been a good one, but Julie Johnson lacks the nuance and subtlety that make a film compelling.