14th October 2018 | 31 Days of “Alternative” Horror: The Haunting of Julia
For any parent, The Haunting of Julia represents a nightmare that goes beyond that of any cautionary tale. The movie opens with the accidental choking of a teenage daughter, Kate, played by Sophie Ward. The mother, Julia, played by Mia Farrow is the one who instinctively gives her dying daughter an emergency tracheotomy, while the Father, Magnus played by Keir Dullea watches, stunned. It is too late, and the girl dies in her mother’s arms. The gut wrenching feeling that comes in that moment are impossible to escape and yet restrained visually, we do not see the actual cutting of her windpipe. Just the aftermath as Mia Farrow stands in complete shock. She spends time in a hospital and when discharged she goes on her separate way, breaking away from her marriage to Magnus. She remains deep in bereavement, and we glance every so often at Magnus who appears cold and possessive. His grief is hidden behind alternative motives. Julia moves into her own place, fully furnished, she feels her way through, but keeps seeing the daughter, Kate in various social settings.
This movie is akin to the earlier Don’t Look Now in its theme of loss he grief, the emotional, spirit searching mother and sober minded father, as well as the references to red, and blood, throughout the film. Julia’s careless mishandles Kate’s sharp edged toys — much like the kitchen knife she used to cut her with — a call back, putting into question whether or not she should have gone so far as to slit her daughters throat to save her life. The killings that follow (and the reports of related deaths) are also reminiscent of Don’t Look Now which played on the distant work-obsessed father consumed with grief but pressing on albeit distracted by the Venice killer — an unlikely substitute for his guilt. Magnus, the husband in the Haunting of Julia is protecting interests. Tom Conti on the other hand plays Mark, the likeable friend who is helping Julia, and the only one allowed in her inner circle.
Veteran British actor, Peter Sellis, who we all know as the voice artist behind Wallace of Wallace and Gromit fame (and for local interest, Last of the Summer Wine) appears interestingly as a concerned neighbour who threatens the husband, Magnus — very gently — with calling the police. Dullea pushes Sellis hard onto the ground, and Sellis gives out a weak little “oh.” It is the only moment in the movie where humour feels acceptable. As Charles Schultz observed once in a Peanuts comic strip, “Pain looks great on other people.” Schadenfreude isn’t the best thing to bring into a film like this, but it became symbolic of this entire movie’s core theme: Pain.
This movie is about varying degrees of grief and empathy, and how people deal differently with pain. It is beautifully shot, incredibly dreamlike. Mia Farrow puts out a stronger performance, I believe, in this film than she did in Rosemary’s Baby. Dullea isn’t that bad as devious husband.
In the spirit of unfinished business, the hauntingly supernatural forces are realistically played, and sit well against our real world fears. But do the supernatural events exist only mind of the ones who are dealing with pain? You can watch all the Saw movies you want this Halloween, and you will sit there safe in the mind that nothing like that could ever happen to you. Just because the events in the Haunting of Julia, like Saw are a work of fiction, doesn’t protect you with any assurance that it can only ever happen, up there, on the screen.
Written by: Stephen Radford
website: stephenradford.com
Next: 15th October: Triangle
