Julia (1977 film)

1977 film by Fred Zinnemann

Julia

Theatrical release poster by Richard Amsel

Directed by| Fred Zinnemann
Screenplay by| Alvin Sargent
Based on| "Julia" in Pentimento
by Lillian Hellman
Produced by| Richard Roth
Starring|

* Jane Fonda
* Vanessa Redgrave
* Jason Robards
* Hal Holbrook
* Rosemary Murphy
* Maximilian Schell
* Meryl Streep

Cinematography| Douglas Slocombe
Edited by|

* Walter Murch
* Marcel Durham

Music by| Georges Delerue

Production
company

20th Century Fox

Distributed by| 20th Century Fox

Release date

* October 2, 1977 (1977-10-2)

Running time

| 118 minutes
Country| United States
Language| English
Budget| $7.84 million[1]
Box office| $20.7 million[2]

Julia is a 1977 American drama film directed by Fred Zinnemann and written by Alvin Sargent. It is based on a chapter from Lillian Hellman's 1973 book Pentimento about the author's relationship with a lifelong friend, Julia, who fought against the Nazis in the years prior to World War II. The film stars Jane Fonda as Hellman and Vanessa Redgrave as Julia. It co-stars Jason Robards, Hal Holbrook, Rosemary Murphy, Maximilian Schell, and Meryl Streep (in her film debut).

Julia released theatrically on October 2, 1977 by 20th Century Fox. The film received positive reviews from critics, grossed $20.7 million against its $7 million budget, and received a leading 11 nominations at the 50th Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Director (for Zinnemann) and Best Actress (for Fonda), and won three awards: Best Supporting Actor (for Robards), Best Supporting Actress (for Redgrave) and Best Adapted Screenplay. At the 35th Golden Globe Awards, the film received a leading seven nominations, including for Best Motion Picture – Drama, Best Director and Best Supporting Actor (for both Robards and Schell), with Fonda and Redgrave winning for Best Actress - Drama and Best Supporting Actress respectively. It also received a leading 10 nominations at the 32nd British Academy Film Awards, including Best Direction and Best Actor in a Supporting Role (for Robards), and won four awards, including Best Film and Best Actress (for Fonda).

## Plot

[edit]

The young Lillian Hellman and her friend Julia, daughter of a wealthy family being brought up by her grandparents in the United States, enjoy a childhood together and a very close friendship in late adolescence. Later, while medical student Julia attends the University of Oxford and the University of Vienna and studies with such luminaries as Sigmund Freud, Lillian, a struggling writer, suffers through revisions of her play with her mentor and lover, famed author Dashiell Hammett, at a beach house.

Julia's university in Vienna is overrun by Nazi thugs, and she is severely injured trying to protect others. Lillian receives word of Julia's condition and rushes to Vienna to be with her. Julia is taken away for "treatment", and Lillian is unable to find her again since the hospital denies any knowledge of her being treated there. She remains in Europe to try to find Julia but is unsuccessful.

Later, during the Nazi era, Lillian has become a celebrated playwright and is invited to a writers' conference in the USSR. Julia, having taken on the battle against Nazism, enlists Lillian en route to smuggle money into Germany to assist the anti-Nazi cause. It is a dangerous mission, especially for a Jewish intellectual on her way to Russia.

Lillian departs for the USSR via Berlin, and the movements of her person, and the placement of her possessions (a hat and a box of candy), are carefully guided by colleagues of Julia through border crossings and inspections. In Berlin, Lillian is told to go to a cafe, where she finds Julia. They speak only briefly. Julia divulges that the "treatment" she received in the hospital in Vienna was the amputation of her leg. Julia tells her that the money she has brought will save 500 to 1,000 people, many of them Jews. Lillian also learns that Julia has a daughter, Lilly, who is living with a baker in Alsace. After Lilian leaves Julia in the cafe and boards the train to Moscow, a man tells her to avoid passing through Germany again after she leaves the USSR.

When Lillian reaches Moscow, the atmosphere is gloomy and oppressive. She receives word that Julia is dead. Returning to London, she is told that Julia has been killed in the Frankfurt apartment of a friend by Nazi agents, although the details of her death are shrouded in secrecy. Lillian unsuccessfully looks for Julia's daughter in Alsace. She returns to the United States and is reunited with Dashiell Hammett. She is haunted by Julia's memories and is distraught at not finding Julia's toddler. She is shocked that Julia's family pretends not to remember Lillian as Julia's friend, clearly wanting to excise from their memory a granddaughter who refused to conform at a time when conformity caused the murder of many innocent people.

The film ends with an image of Lillian Hellman many years later seated in a boat alone, fishing. She reveals in voiceover that she continued to live with Hammett for another thirty years and outlived him.

## Cast

[edit]

* Jane Fonda as Lillian
* Vanessa Redgrave as Julia
* Jason Robards as Hammett
* Hal Holbrook as Alan
* Rosemary Murphy as Dottie
* Maximilian Schell as Johann
* Dora Doll as Woman Passenger
* Elisabeth Mortensen as Girl Passenger
* Meryl Streep as Anne Marie
* John Glover as Sammy
* Lisa Pelikan as Young Julia
* Susan Jones as Young Lillian
* Maurice Denham as Undertaker
* Gerard Buhr as Passport Officer
* Cathleen Nesbitt as Grandmother
* Lambert Wilson as Walter Franz

The film marked the film debut of Meryl Streep and Lisa Pelikan.

## Production

[edit]

Julia was shot on location in England and France. Although Lillian Hellman claimed the story was based on true events that occurred early in her life, the filmmakers later came to believe that most of it was fictionalized. Director Fred Zinnemann would later comment, "Lillian Hellman in her own mind owned half the Spanish Civil War, while Hemingway owned the other half. She would portray herself in situations that were not true. An extremely talented, brilliant writer, but she was a phony character, I'm sorry to say. My relations with her were very guarded and ended in pure hatred."[3]

The film was based on the "Julia" chapter of Hellman's memoir Pentimento. On June 30, 1976, as the film was going into production, Hellman wrote about the screenplay to its producer:[4]

> This is not a work of fiction and certain laws have to be followed for that reason ... Your major difficulty to me is the treatment of Lillian as the leading character. The reason is simple: no matter what she does in this story–and I do not deny the danger I was in when I took the money into Germany–my role was passive. And nobody and nothing can change that unless you write a fictional and different story ... Isn't it necessary to know that I am a Jew? That, of course, is what mainly made the danger.

In a 1979 television interview with Dick Cavett, author Mary McCarthy, long Hellman's political adversary and the object of her negative literary judgment, said of Hellman that "every word she writes is a lie, including 'and' and 'the'."[5] Hellman responded by filing a US$2,500,000 defamation suit against McCarthy, interviewer Dick Cavett, and PBS.[5] McCarthy produced evidence she said proved that Hellman had lied in some accounts of her life. Cavett said he sympathized more with McCarthy than Hellman in the lawsuit, but "everybody lost" as a result of it.[5] Norman Mailer attempted unsuccessfully to mediate the dispute through an open letter he published in the New York Times.[6] At the time of her death in 1984, Hellman was still in litigation with McCarthy; her executors dropped the suit.[7]

In 1983, New York psychiatrist Muriel Gardiner became involved in the libel suit between McCarthy and Hellman. She claimed to be the model for the character named Julia in Pentimento, and in the movie Julia based on a chapter of that book. Hellman, who never met Gardiner, said that "Julia" was somebody else.[8]

Gardiner wrote that, while she never met Hellman, she had often heard about her from her friend Wolf Schwabacher, who was Hellman's lawyer. By Gardiner's account, Schwabacher had visited Gardiner in Vienna. After Muriel Gardiner and Joseph Buttinger moved into their house at Brookdale Farm in Pennington, New Jersey in 1940, they divided the house in two. They rented half of it to Wolf and Ethel Schwabacher for more than ten years.[9]

Many people believe that Hellmann based her story on Gardiner's life. Gardiner's editor cited the unlikelihood that there were two millionaire American women who were medical students in Vienna in the late 1930s.[8]

## Reception

[edit]

Julia holds a 73% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 30 reviews, with an average rating of 6.7/10. The consensus summarizes: "Julia is a handsomely crafted and stirringly performed meditation on friendship and political activism, although its tasteful formalism often undercuts the multifaceted passion of these historical figures."[10] On Metacritic, the film earned a weighted average score of 75 out of 100, based on 10 reviews, signifying "generally favorable reviews".[11]

Variety gave it a positive review, praising Jane Fonda and Vanessa Redgrave as being "dynamite together on the screen", Richard Roth's production as "handsome and tasteful", as well as the period costumes and production design.[12] Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat of Spirituality & Practice described the film as "extraordinary", writing: "Julia gives us a genuine and affecting portrait of a friendship between two women who confirm each other and strengthen their bonds over the years."[13]

The film received some criticism as failing to adequately portray the friendship between the two leads. Roger Ebert called the film a "fascinating story", but felt the film suffered from being told by Lillian Hellman's point of view. "The film never really establishes a relationship between the two women," he wrote. "It's awkward, the way the film has to suspend itself between Julia – its ostensible subject – and Lillian Hellman, its real subject." He gave it two and a half out of four stars.[14]

John Simon said of Julia "Very little of what happens in the film is intrinsically interesting."[15] TV Guide gave it three out of five stars and declared it "Beautifully crafted, nominated for 11 Academy Awards, a big hit at the box office--and a dramatic dud ... If you like red nail polish, faux-cynicism, painfully brave smiles and European train stations, Julia may be your kind of cocktail."[16]

The film earned $7.5 million in North American rentals.[17]

## Awards and nominations

[edit]

Award  | Category  | Nominee(s)  | Result

|
|
|

Academy Awards | Best Picture | Richard Roth  | Nominated
Best Director | Fred Zinnemann | Nominated
Best Actress | Jane Fonda | Nominated
Best Supporting Actor | Jason Robards | Won
Maximilian Schell | Nominated
Best Supporting Actress | Vanessa Redgrave | Won
Best Adapted Screenplay | Alvin Sargent | Won
Best Cinematography | Douglas Slocombe | Nominated
Best Costume Design | Anthea Sylbert | Nominated
Best Film Editing | Walter Murch[nb 1] | Nominated
Best Original Score | Georges Delerue | Nominated
British Academy Film Awards | Best Film | Richard Roth  | Won
Best Direction | Fred Zinnemann  | Nominated
Best Actress in a Leading Role | Jane Fonda  | Won
Best Actor in a Supporting Role | Jason Robards  | Nominated
Best Screenplay | Alvin Sargent  | Won
Best Cinematography | Douglas Slocombe  | Won
Best Costume Design | Anthea Sylbert, Joan Bridge and Annalisa Nasalli-Rocca  | Nominated
Best Editing | Walter Murch  | Nominated
Best Original Music | Georges Delerue  | Nominated
Best Production Design | Gene Callahan, Carmen Dillon and Willy Holt | Nominated
British Society of Cinematographers Awards | Best Cinematography in a Theatrical Feature Film | Douglas Slocombe  | Won
César Awards | Best Foreign Film | Fred Zinnemann  | Nominated
David di Donatello Awards | Best Foreign Actress | Jane Fonda  | Won[a]
David Giovani Award  | Fred Zinnemann  | Won
Directors Guild of America Awards | Outstanding Directorial Achievement in Motion Pictures | Nominated
Golden Globe Awards | Best Motion Picture – Drama | Nominated
Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama | Jane Fonda  | Won
Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture | Jason Robards  | Nominated
Maximilian Schell  | Nominated
Best Supporting Actress – Motion Picture | Vanessa Redgrave  | Won
Best Director – Motion Picture | Fred Zinnemann  | Nominated
Best Screenplay – Motion Picture | Alvin Sargent  | Nominated
Kansas City Film Critics Circle Awards  | Best Supporting Actor  | Jason Robards  | Won
Best Supporting Actress  | Vanessa Redgrave  | Won
Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards | Best Supporting Actor | Jason Robards  | Won
Best Supporting Actress | Vanessa Redgrave  | Won
Best Cinematography | Douglas Slocombe  | Won
Nastro d'Argento | Best Foreign Director  | Fred Zinnemann  | Won
National Board of Review Awards | Top Ten Films | 3rd Place
National Society of Film Critics Awards | Best Actress | Jane Fonda  | 3rd Place
Best Supporting Actor | Maximilian Schell  | 3rd Place
New York Film Critics Circle Awards | Best Supporting Actor | Won
Best Supporting Actress | Vanessa Redgrave  | Runner-up
Writers Guild of America Awards | Best Drama – Adapted from Another Medium | Alvin Sargent  | Won

After Redgrave was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress, the Jewish Defense League objected to her nomination because she had narrated and helped fund a documentary entitled The Palestinian, which supported a Palestinian state. They also picketed the Oscar ceremony.[19]

## Notes

[edit]

1. ^ Marcel Durham is listed as an editor for the film in some credit listings for Julia, including the credits database of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences (AMPAS). However, he is not listed as a nominee for the Academy Award in the AMPAS awards database.[18]

1. ^ Tied with Simone Signoret for Madame Rosa.

## References

[edit]

1. ^ Aubrey Solomon, Twentieth Century Fox: A Corporate and Financial History, Scarecrow Press, 1989 p258
2. ^ "Julia (1977) (1977)". Box Office Mojo. 1977-10-02. Retrieved 2013-01-21.
3. ^ Zinnemann, Fred (2005). Fred Zinnemann: interviews, University Press of Mississippi (2005) p156. ISBN 9781578066988. Retrieved 2013-01-21.
4. ^ Austenfeld, American Women Writers, pp. 102-03
5. ^ a b c Martinson, Lillian Hellman, pp. 354–56
6. ^ Norman Mailer,"An Appeal to Lillian Hellman and Mary McCarthy", nytimes.com, May 11, 1980; accessed December 16, 2011.
7. ^ Frances Kiernan, "Seeing Mary Plain", nytimes.com, accessed November 25, 2015.
8. ^ a b McDowell, Edwin (April 29, 1983). "New Memoir Stirs 'Julia' Controversy". New York Times. Retrieved December 16, 2011.
9. ^ Muriel Gardiner, Code Name "Mary": Memoirs of an American Woman in the Austrian Underground (Yale University Press, 1983), xv-xvi
10. ^ "Julia (1977)". Rotten Tomatoes. Retrieved December 31, 2023.
11. ^ "Julia (1977)". Metacritic. Retrieved September 25, 2024.
12. ^ "Julia – Variety". Variety.com. 1976-12-31. Retrieved 2018-04-16.
13. ^ Brussat, Frederic; Brussat, Mary Ann. "Julia". Spirituality & Practice. Retrieved September 25, 2024.
14. ^ Ebert, Roger (1977-01-01). "Julia Movie Review & Film Summary (1977)". Roger Ebert. Retrieved 2018-04-16.
15. ^ Simon, John (1982). Reverse Angle: A Decade of American Film. Crown Publishers Inc. p. 338. ISBN 9780517544716.
16. ^ "Julia - Movie Reviews and Movie Ratings". TV Guide. 2017-09-29. Retrieved 2018-04-16.
17. ^ Solomon p 234
18. ^ "Academy Awards Database - 50th (1977)". Archived from the original on 2014-02-19. Retrieved 2014-02-19.
19. ^ "Vanessa Redgrave's controversial Oscar speech". ABC7 Los Angeles. Archived from the original on 2017-01-30. Retrieved 2017-01-24.

## External links

[edit]

* Julia at IMDb
* Julia at the TCM Movie Database
* Julia at the AFI Catalog of Feature Films
* Julia at Box Office Mojo
* Julia at Rotten Tomatoes

* v
* t
* e

Films directed by Fred Zinnemann

* Redes (1936)
* That Mothers Might Live (1938)
* Stuffie (1940)
* Forbidden Passage (1941)
* Kid Glove Killer (1942)
* Eyes in the Night (1942)
* The Seventh Cross (1944)
* Little Mister Jim (1946)
* My Brother Talks to Horses (1947)
* The Search (1948)
* Act of Violence (1949)
* The Men (1950)
* Benjy (1951)
* Teresa (1951)
* High Noon (1952)
* The Member of the Wedding (1952)
* From Here to Eternity (1953)
* Oklahoma! (1955)
* A Hatful of Rain (1957)
* The Nun's Story (1959)
* The Sundowners (1960)
* Behold a Pale Horse (1964)
* A Man for All Seasons (1966)
* The Day of the Jackal (1973)
* Julia (1977)
* Five Days One Summer (1982)

* v
* t
* e

BAFTA Award for Best Film

Best Film
from any Source
1947-1967|

* The Best Years of Our Lives (1947)
* Hamlet (1948)
* Bicycle Thieves (1949)
* All About Eve (1950)
* La Ronde (1951)
* The Sound Barrier (1952)
* Forbidden Games (1953)
* The Wages of Fear (1954)
* Richard III (1955)
* Gervaise (1956)
* The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957)
* Room at the Top (1958)
* Ben-Hur (1959)
* The Apartment (1960)
* Ballad of a Soldier (1961)
* The Hustler (1961)
* Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
* Tom Jones (1963)
* Dr. Strangelove (1964)
* My Fair Lady (1965)
* Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966)
* A Man for All Seasons (1967)

Best Film
1968-present|

* The Graduate (1968)
* Midnight Cowboy (1969)
* Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1970)
* Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971)
* Cabaret (1972)
* Day for Night (1973)
* Lacombe, Lucien (1974)
* Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore (1975)
* One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (1976)
* Annie Hall (1977)
* Julia (1978)
* Manhattan (1979)
* The Elephant Man (1980)
* Chariots of Fire (1981)
* Gandhi (1982)
* Educating Rita (1983)
* The Killing Fields (1984)
* The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985)
* A Room with a View (1986)
* Jean de Florette (1987)
* The Last Emperor (1988)
* Dead Poets Society (1989)
* Goodfellas (1990)
* The Commitments (1991)
* Howards End (1992)
* Schindler's List (1993)
* Four Weddings and a Funeral (1994)
* Sense and Sensibility (1995)
* The English Patient (1996)
* The Full Monty (1997)
* Shakespeare in Love (1998)
* American Beauty (1999)
* Gladiator (2000)
* The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001)
* The Pianist (2002)
* The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003)
* The Aviator (2004)
* Brokeback Mountain (2005)
* The Queen (2006)
* Atonement (2007)
* Slumdog Millionaire (2008)
* The Hurt Locker (2009)
* The King's Speech (2010)
* The Artist (2011)
* Argo (2012)
* 12 Years a Slave (2013)
* Boyhood (2014)
* The Revenant (2015)
* La La Land (2016)
* Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri (2017)
* Roma (2018)
* 1917 (2019)
* Nomadland (2020)
* The Power of the Dog (2021)
* All Quiet on the Western Front (2022)
* Oppenheimer (2023)
* Conclave (2024)

* v
* t
* e

Dashiell Hammett

Novels|

* Red Harvest
* The Dain Curse
* The Maltese Falcon
* The Glass Key
* The Thin Man

Characters|

* The Continental Op
* Sam Spade
* Ned Beaumont
* Nick and Nora Charles

Screenplays|

* After the Thin Man
* Shadow of the Thin Man
* The Glass Key
* Watch on the Rhine

Comics|

* Secret Agent X-9

Film
adaptations|

* Roadhouse Nights (1930)
* City Streets (1931)
* The Maltese Falcon (1931)
* The Thin Man (1934)
* Woman in the Dark (1934)
* The Glass Key (1935)
* Satan Met a Lady (1936)
* After the Thin Man (1936)
* Secret Agent X-9 (1937)
* Another Thin Man (1939)
* The Maltese Falcon (1941)
* Shadow of the Thin Man (1941)
* The Glass Key (1942)
* The Thin Man Goes Home (1945)
* Secret Agent X-9 (1945)
* Song of the Thin Man (1947)
* The Dain Curse (1978)
* No Good Deed (2002)

Related|

* Lillian Hellman (partner)
* Julia (1977 film)
* Hammett (1982 film)
* Dash and Lilly (1999 film)

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