Product Description

Based on a story from Lillian Hellman's best-seller, "Pentimento." Hellman (Jane Fonda) recalls her lifelong relationship with the fiercely independent and politically minded Julia (Venessa Redgrave). Born to great wealth, Julia devotes her life to political causes fighting fascism in the 1930's. While Hellman is travelling in Europe, she is approached by one of Julia's political friends (Maximilian Schell) and is swept into Julia's world, smuggling money across hostile borders. Featuring Meryl Streep in her film debut, Julia won three 1977 Academy Awards®, including Vanessa Redgrave as Best Supporting Actress, Jason Robards as Best Supporting Actor and Best Screenplay Adaptation.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #10944 in DVD
• Brand: Twentieth Century Fox
• Released on: 2006-02-07
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Aspect ratio: 1.85:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English, French, German
• Number of discs: 1
• Running time: 117 minutes

Amazon.com essential video
Part of the late-'70s wave of films about strong women (as if none had existed before that), Julia starred Jane Fonda as writer Lillian Hellman in a story based on some of Hellman's own writings. The stronger woman here is the title character (Vanessa Redgrave), a socially active young woman who teaches Hellman the importance of sticking to her beliefs--even in the face of Nazi terror. The subplot focuses on Hellman's growth as a writer, under the supportive wing of lover Dashiell Hammett (Jason Robards). Lushly photographed by Fred Zinnemann, it's one of the few films that projects a sense of how a writer writes; it also was unafraid to explore the dark consequences of conscience, when Resistance-fighter Julia is captured by the Germans. Robards and Redgrave both won Oscars (leading to Redgrave's Zionist hoodlums acceptance speech). Watch for Meryl Streep in a tiny role in her film debut. --Marshall Fine

Customer Reviews

MESMERIZING
Fact or fiction, or a combination of both, taken on its own terms as a movie, Julia is astonishing and effective. The attention to detail in costumes, set decorations, props, locations dazzle you and place you squarely in another time and place. The performances, particularly the intimate friendship between Fonda as Hellman and Redgrave as Julia, blow you away. Redgrave embodies this brilliant character with knowing subtlety; you get the feeling she is Julia to some degree, and probably is. The exploration of adult friendship in a time of peril finds its center in a well-crafted suspense story that only ever hints at real danger, yet it is the slow and deliberate revelations regarding Julia's fate that provide tension and heartbreak. This is a purposely artful film, with its share of indulgence, but each one works as a part of a lovely whole. And the world Helman created in her story -- with its rich characters, both real and imagined -- is created here with an evocative freshness. Like a memory you love to call upon, this movie works best in total silence, except perhaps rain falling outside. Let it take you away.

Jane Fonda Comes of Age
Too bad this one's out of stock, but worse was that the poltical backlash Vanessa Redgrave's Best Supporting Actress acceptance speech detracted from the film's importance. Despite that, "Julia" may well be the best work in Redgrave's and Jane Fonda's impressive bodies of work. For the latter, the film launched the socially-themed works that followed, and Fonda may well have come of age in this one. She plays writer Lillian Hellman to Redgrave's title character, an upper-class rich kid who grows into social activist and lays her life on the line to smuggle condemned Jews from the death camps of Hitler's Third Reich. Redgrave is superlative, and Fonda is rivting as Julia's childhood friend who gradually comes to recognize the evil unleashed by man on man at the time. As Julia's long-time lover, Dashell Hammitt, the late Jason Robards nailed down one of his back-to-back Supporting Actor Oscars ("All the President's Men" was the other), and the raw talent of the Fonda-Redgrave-Robards package helps make "Julia" one of Fonda's best works. The importance of the film's subject matter is so overwhelming that it easily displaces the Vietnam-related controvery that dogged (and may still) Fonda through the '70s and the unpopular words Redgrave used in her Oscar acceptance speech (she was literally booed off the stage). Far from a "chick flic," "Julia" is an important film that delves into but one relam in the darkest of human history, and it's earned a lofty spot among films of its genre.

MARVELOUS FILM
"Julia" is a truly marvelous film; literate, fascinating, fun. Its DVD release (finally due on 2/7/06) should serve as a welcome addition to any DVD collection. Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave are spellbinding as devoted girlhood friends who face a dangerous test, with ultimately devastating consequences, together. Meryl Streep makes her film debut here; both Redgrave and Jason Robards won Best Supporting Oscars for their roles. Fonda was also nominated (much deserved), as was the film itself - undoubtedly one of the best pictures of 1977. My suggestion? Buy it.