Julia's Eyes

Synopsis: Identical twins Julia and Sara (Belen Rueda) suffer a degenerative illness that will cause them to go irreversibly blind. When Julia finds Sara hanged in the cellar of her home, she is convinced that this is not simply a suicide. Julia's husband, Isaac (Luis Homar) is impatient with Julia's growing paranoia, but the woman's fears seem grounded as more incidents of a scary and unexplained nature start happening.

In a film of this nature it's obviously ill-advised to tell too much, making reviewing it a fraught exercise. I'm obviously out on a limb with this one, judging by the many glowing reviews. But here's the rub - this is supposed to be a horror film, and I found myself scared for hardly any of the time, and even worse, I couldn't stop thinking of how totally derivative the film's plot and style is. The opening scene of Julia’s Eyes has many of the classic elements - a dark and stormy night, with the phonogram inexplicably playing a song Sara hated, and the door to the cellar invitingly open. As Julia descends the stairs to find Sara, the only word going through my head is "melodrama". But then the film's tone shifts, assumes a degree of credibility and for a while we feel that Julia is safe in the warmth of Isaac's love and protection. Once she is determined to find "the truth" behind her twin's death, however, there is no stopping the chain of set pieces.

Many overused elements are piled one on top of the other - creaking chairs in darkened room, creepy cats, an old blind lady, a shadowy man with whom Sarah had been seen at a hotel, another old man who claims to know the nature of the shadowy man, a mysterious set of keys, and a male nurse, Ivan (Pablo Derqui) who is not necessarily what he seems. And amidst it all there's the deterioration of Julia's eyesight.

I have little quibble with the film's execution. After all, with Guillermo del Toro as producer we have some strong cred and this ensures top drawer production values. Everything looks good; the lighting is superb and reflects well the problems with Julia’s sight. But del Toro is unfortunately neither the writer nor director, and Morales’ script really bothered me. The character of Julia, although beautifully acted by Rueda, does one dumb thing after another. Why is it in horror films that people choose to do the most idiotic things, things which no sensible person would dream of doing?

Certainly there are moments of suspense and tension enough, but they are let down by the overly convoluted plotting, and gratuitous characters devised to put us off the scent. In fact, there are so many red herrings thrown in that one almost ceases to focus upon the main plot. And as for stealing a critical scene from Terence Young’s 1967 film, Wait Until Dark, in which Audrey Hepburn plays a blind woman - give me a break!
That said, it is refreshing to see a modern horror film that eschews the ubiquitous slasher stylings. I just would have liked to have been a lot more scared.

 

 

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