Los ojos de Julia

I watched this movie on the plane the other day, trying to find something to keep me awake (as sleep on an airplane never leaves you rested, but merely with a stiff body).

What I saw was, however - to my positive surprise - much more than just something to pass time, as I actually enjoyed it a lot.

I find the plot quite fascinating and very original, and it has, with its unpredictability, more than just a few surprises in store. Granted, there are a few inconsistencies with the storyline, but I didn't see them as a big problem, as the movie, as a whole, works.

All in all, a really good horror thriller, which keeps you guessing till the very end.

After the death of the blind Sara (Belén Rueda), who hung herself in the basement of he house, her twin sister Julia (Belén Rueda) suspects that she was actually murdered. Julia has a degenerative problem in her eyes and is losing her sight and she temporarily moves with her husband Isaac (Lluís Homar) to Sara's house to arrange her funeral. Julia goes to the Centro Baumann for blinds where Sara frequented and she learns from the others blind users that Sara had a boyfriend.

Julia is chased by a mysterious man but the police inspector Dimas (Francesc Orella) does not believe on her. Julia follows the last steps of Sara trying to find the identity of her secret lover. Julia is surrounded by deaths and weird events while she loses her sight. Is she also delusional?

"Los Ojos de Julia" is an atmospheric film but flawed and misguider. The director gives the sensation of a supernatural story and ends like a "giallo" blended with "Blind Terror". The name of Guillermo del Toro, who is the producer, is also used to mislead the viewers. Belén Rueda has a magnificent performance; the cinematography and the camera work are excellent; the plot is intriguing; but the resolution is very disappointing. My vote is six.

Title (Brazil): "Os Olhos de Júlia" ("The Eyes of Julia")

Julia, (Belen Rueda) like her twin sister Sara suffers from a degenerative nerve disease which is slowly but surely turning her blind, with her twin having succumbed to total blindness earlier. When her sister dies, apparently of a suicide, Julia feels there's something not quite right. Her sister wasn't depressed, and in fact had been looking forward to a potentially curable operation. Plus, there's rumours of Sara having had a mysterious boyfriend. But why didn't he go the funeral? Doubted by her Psychologist husband Isaacs (Lluis Homar) Julia resolves to investigate. But her disease is getting worse, and she keeps feeling that somebody is watching her every move. Is she cracking up? Or is something more sinister at play here?

Julia's Eyes starts off very promising indeed, with a gripping first hour, as director Guillem Morales ratchets up the tension with some clever visual tricks and an increasingly dark and creepy tone, as well as some entertaining red herrings.

However, by the third act, it unfortunately gets kinda... silly. It also unfortunately has a rather ludicrous revelation, as well as some clichéd bad decision making on the part of the protagonist. It also could have been a leaner affair, being rather needlessly overlong.

As well as this, the film doesn't really cover all the elements of its rather layered plot as well as it could have, with one or two loose ends that will very probably have the viewer raising a suspicious eyebrow.

That having said, it has some decent performances, is pretty absorbing and again, has a nigh on excellent first half.

Any horror or chiller fan should find much to like here, but ultimately it comes across as rather dissatisfying, considering its ambition.

7/10- A solid enough film, that's worth checking out overall, but potentially could have been excellent.

A respectable blend of drama and horror, using strengths of both but also succumbing occasionally to the weaknesses.

Suspense is present from the very beginning, building to an exciting and unexpected climax, unfortunately falling a bit flat afterward. In fact, the last 30 seconds of the film somewhat blemish the drama of the story as a whole, mostly because the ending touches on a relationship that was hardly explored and not at all significant through the rest of the film, partly because of the focus on the very thing that makes this movie good: the constant twists and turns in the story. This also leads to some ideas that are passable but don't make nearly as much sense as they're supposed to; particularly the whole "people who aren't seen"/"There was no man with her (Sara)"/"Don't look at me!" motif. I still don't get it, but it has little impact on the story anyway.

I believe the entirety of the story could have used some fine tuning, and run time could have been trimmed by 10 to 15 minutes... But overall it's engaging, well acted, and sets an excellent and fitting mood visually. Thrillers that can't project the protagonist's experience to the viewer fail horribly... this movie does an outstanding job providing a sense of confinement that fits the title character's world, and this is where its greatest strength lies.

Although character relationships are a bit thin and suspense doesn't hit many high notes, this is a fairly exciting thrill ride and a good effort all around. One last thing, I would recommend watching it without distraction... the mood is more visual and in the flow of the story than it is intellectual or suspenseful, and it's easy to lose interest if you step away for a few minutes.

I really can not understand how some people have written about this film: boring, long without suspension, and many more of these baseless comments. A lot of energy has been put into this film. The directing and acting were really great. The music was also very good. I remembered Hitchcock's psychological film. Both of these characters killed people due to mental problems. I just didn't like the overly romantic ending. It is very easy to write a review on a movie. We can easily say that it is a bad movie and say bad things about it. But making a movie is very hard work and it is different from writing with a mobile phone which is a bad or boring movie. We have to be a little fair.