Every time I watch Pedro Almodóvar's films, I am amazed at his master-level control. He also transforms concepts into stories and then presents the textual stories through the lens. The Spanish film director, using his rich colors, constantly depicts female characters of different ages and social classes. The women under his lens look more three-dimensional, moving and emotional. Even if they are abandoned by marriage, society, or even fate, they can stand up strong after the experience of time, return to the same place alone, and face the brave face. Past and present, re-enter your own future. This time, his new film "Julietta" once again leads everyone into the inner world of women. The age of the main characters ranges from 25 to 40 years old. The "unveiling" shot of the film is a close-up of a red "curtain", which is actually the heroine: the red dress on Julieta's chest. In the director's self-report, he deliberately talked about the first shot of the film and its important meaning.
Under the red skirt folds, Julieta's heartbeat is hidden, and the slight breathing movement makes the red folds in front of the camera tremble from time to time. Immediately afterwards, a palm-sized clay sculpture was placed in front of the camera, which was also on Julieta's chest, and was then wrapped up by her heart. The camera zoomed out, and we saw the heroine of the film: Julieta's full picture. She is sitting at your desk, packing your bags and getting ready to move. That's where the story begins.
What the director, Almodovar, is going to tell this time is a story of a woman with a heavy heart. Her heartbeat has become an invisible element in the camera. Every time she is silent on camera, her heart is beating. Perceiving this, and looking at the close-up of the women under Almodóvar's lens, one can feel their melancholy, disappointment, and heartbreak even more. This is not difficult to understand. At the Cannes Film Festival, the promotional souvenir for the film was a heart-shaped USB flash drive with the tattoo pattern of the hero in the film engraved on it. The director said that his request for the soundtrack of the film was also a feeling of heartbeat.
The film is also about motherhood, a theme that Almodovar never deviates from in his films. The heroine in the film, Julieta, is a teacher of classical literature. She once said to the sculptor Ava: "The gods created men and other beings with the help of clay and fire." And Ava said when Julieta first saw the "Seated Man" sculpture: "It's heavier than you think because I use metal for the inside and terracotta for the skin." According to Almodovar, women not only create life, but they also shape men's lives. In the film, Ava creates the "Seated Man" sculpture, and Julieta wraps it with the tenderness of a lifetime, foreshadowing the story of the two women and one man.
Women Who Walked in Men's Lives The protagonist, Su An, in the film, is a character who flows between different women. His ex-wife died of an illness. He and Ava have always had a physical relationship and later met on a train. He married Julieta, and after Julieta became pregnant, she married and had children. As Julieta prepares to return to teaching at school, the home's nanny warns her that the same thing will happen again.
And Su An's tattoo also expresses the same meaning. In the middle of the initials of the two wives is a sailboat, which is the representative of Suan's fisherman's profession and a symbol of his wandering among women. This is not a metaphor for the relationship between men and women in marriage. In every man's life, there are constantly different women coming and going. Of course, this is from a male-dominated perspective. Due to the physical characteristics of males in today's society, even if they are over sixty years old, as long as they have a certain life foundation, they are more likely to get married again. It is undeniable that the relative It is much easier than for women of the same age, who are constantly looking for a new partner.
The same thing happened in Julieta's hometown. The seriously ill mother was confined to the house in bed, but the father came together with the young nanny at home, and after the death of the mother, he added a younger brother to her. When Julieta came home to visit her mother, she deliberately slept in the same bed as her mother and spent the night together. She felt her mother's lonely future. When the mother, dressed as Julieta, stood in the courtyard in beautiful clothes, watching her husband and the young nanny farm and joke together, she just looked at them blankly. This kind of thing happens over and over again. It seems that it never changes, and there are no exceptions.
The end of one marriage in the dialogue between death and love in life is also the beginning of another marriage. What's more dramatic is that the alternation of death and rebirth in the film has become a key factor in changing Julieta's fate. Director Almodovar said that the train is his favorite image symbol, so Julieta's important life journey was placed on the train, where she met her own destiny. On this train, she met death for the first time, but also met love at the same time.
The director said that this is a dialogue between death and love, and it is also the beginning of life. On this night, a strange passenger chose to end his life on the rails, and Julieta, while blaming herself, had a spark of love with Su An, and she became pregnant with her future daughter Antti that night. Asia. Similarly, on the night that Su An's seriously ill wife died, Julieta came to his house and had sex with Su An, and the two decided to get married and have children. In Julieta's story, death always comes unexpectedly and love always soothes people's hearts. It was not until Su An's unexpected departure that she was completely spared and became a soulless body.
Three Partings and Three Stories The story script of the film was adapted by director Almodovar based on three short stories by Canadian female writer Alice Monroe. Alice Munro became the thirteenth woman writer to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. In the story of the movie, there are three important separations, namely, the strange man on the train, the husband before going to sea, and the daughter before going away. And these three people had a very important influence on Julieta's life. They appeared in Julieta's three different stages: from a girl, to a woman, and then to a mother. And Julieta only became alert to losing the people around her when she saw her daughter leave for the third time after experiencing the first two partings and regrets.
Unfortunately, Julieta has always been evasive and aphasic in the part of communicating with people. Facing the greetings from strangers on the train, she treated them indifferently and got up and left. Facing her husband's explanation and earnest talk, she chose to avoid going out. Her two escapes brought heavy consequences, and she began to regret her actions so that her whole person completely collapsed, so she didn't have the courage to mention it with her daughter.
As a result, the silence and aphasia between her and her daughter eventually led to her daughter's confusion and running away. Julieta lost everything at one point, but 12 years later, when she once again decided to face the past and find her daughter, she found the key to the matter. She chose to write down her own past and show it to her daughter to let her know what she should have known, her mother's past, to fill the gap in communication between the two.
The turning point of the story also happened when Julieta moved back to the old apartment in Madrid, walked down a familiar street, met an old friend, and then found the news of her daughter. Finally, at the apartment address many years ago, waiting for a letter from my daughter. Director Almodovar said in his elaboration that he is a director who believes in repetition and rehearsal. People will always repeat many of the same situations unknowingly where they have lived, just as life gives us the opportunity to rehearse before major misfortunes come.
Rediscovering the ability to talk to people Julieta likes the white color of vanilla, which itself is a color that suppresses emotions, and this is also an extension of her character, suppressing emotions and poor communication. When her daughter rented an apartment in Madrid for her, it was filled with brightly colored wallpaper, which her daughter and her friends liked very much, but Julieta said she wanted to replace the wallpaper, and she eventually painted it vanilla white. Julieta moved to an unfamiliar neighborhood after her daughter left, and the new apartment is also simple in design. Until she chose to move back to the old apartment and saw the original floor-to-ceiling windows and the old fireplace, after three separations, Julieta decided not to run away, refused the invitation to go to Portugal with her new partner, and began to be alone in the apartment, Change your destiny by writing about the past and acting on it.
In today's urban life and urban families, those who are important to us in our lives often drift away from us for one reason or another. This is also the social issue and family relationship that the film is trying to express. When Julieta became a mother and took her daughter to visit her mother, she could only feel the sorrow of her mother. When Julieta's daughter lost her eldest son, it was only after 12 years that she sent her first letter to her mother, expressing that she understood her mother's feelings of losing her relatives.
In women's emotional relationships, it's like a reincarnation, and only when people have gone through similar stages and emotions in their life's journey can people understand each other naturally, without the need for more words. Before that, a lack of communication often led to emotional disconnects. The film tells the story of a mother who was abandoned by her daughter for twelve years without exaggerating the sadness. The director said that what he wanted to express was what happened, instead of emphasizing how painful the people in the incident were, because such things are constantly being staged around us.
The moment of the best editing in the film has also become the poster idea for the film. When the daughter lifted the towel on her mother's head, her mother suddenly turned into a middle-aged person. On the poster, Julieta unveiled the bath towel herself, and below is a middle-aged person who has been entangled by the fate of parting and is a little lost. Whether with the help of others or our own hands, this is how we grow old under the watchful eyes of others and ourselves.
Almodovar used this film to put three stories on a woman, telling the story of a woman in different stages of life when the relatives around her keep leaving her. Some are active, some are not. Julieta finally found her own answer: it is passive. How do you face such a fact and how do you get along with it? Reference English information Press notes Julietta finally recommends the original soundtrack album of "Julietta". It contains a Sin'te vas. It sounds very nice, and you can search for Julieta on Shrimps.
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