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In
the late 1950's, Doris Day, America's singing sweetheart, branched
out from the romantic comedy genre with a handful of thrillers such
as The Man Who Knew Too Much (1956), Midnight Lace
(1960) and the damsel-in-distress film Julie (1956) a laugh
out loud, high-flying, bad movie classic.
Julie
begins as most Doris Day movies do, with a sappy title song sung
by its star. Amazingly, the theme from Julie received an
Academy Award nomination.
The
first clue that this isn't your average Doris Day picture is that
the film is in back and white. It's oddly disconcerting to see Day
in anything less than vibrant Technicolor. Perhaps black and white
was chosen to give the movie more atmosphere, if so, it didn't work.
We
find Day, as the title character Julie Benton, in the middle of
an argument with her husband Lyle, played by Louis Jourdan. She
gets behind the wheel of her convertible and berates him for his
jealous outburst at their Pebble Beach country club.
"It's
unforgivable," she scolds as she twists the steering wheel
back and fourth, never once coming close to matching the moving
scenery projected on the screen behind her. Suddenly, Lyle presses
his foot down on the gas pedal, sending them on a wild and dangerous
drive along the picturesque Monterey coastline. Julie tries desperately
to control the car as they speed faster and faster, screeching along
hairpin turns. Lyle finally brings the car to a stop and Julie runs
for it, collapsing at a picture perfect spot overlooking the sea.
"I'm
so sorry," he begs, "So desperately sorry. Help me fight
this thing. I was jealous, jealous, blindly jealous."
"He
nearly killed us both," Day needlessly reiterates in a breathy
voiceover, "He seemed so sorry, so desperately sorry."
Later,
in front of the fireplace of their beachfront home, they discuss
the mysterious circumstances surrounding the suicide of Julie's
first husband. Lyle cannot stand to have any man, dead or alive,
in Julie's life. "I had to have more answers," Day whispers.
The
next day at the country club, she meets with Cliff (Barry Sullivan)
her former brother-in-law. "Julie, did it ever occur to you
that Bob's neck could've been placed in that rope after he'd been
strangled… by a murderer? Lyle was there that night wasn't
he?"
This
presents poor Julie with a classic bad movie conundrum. Does he
want to kiss me, or kill me?
Later,
as Lyle tickles the ivories, Julie tells us that, "I'd listen
by the hour to Lyle practicing." Never mind the fact that we
can clearly see she's lying on the couch listening to her husband
play. The constant voiceover narration in Julie is so wildly
unnecessary that it borders on parody.
"But
today there was something strangely disturbing about his music,
a sort of savage fury that was almost frightening. Gradually, as
I listened to him play," she drones on, "I began evolving
a plan."
And
what is her grand scheme?
"If
Bob hadn't died," she asks in bed that night, "What would
you have done? Would you have done it… killed him?"
Lyle
admits to the crime. "I had to lie there in his arms, lie there
in panic and wait for morning to come," she tells us as waves
crash meaningfully outside their bedroom window.
Come
morning, she sends Lyle on an errand next door. Once again, though
we can clearly see everything that she's doing, Julie gives us a
ridiculous play-by-play account of her desperate grab at freedom.
Any normal person would simply make a run for it. Not our Julie.
Though her window of opportunity is slim at best, she still takes
the time to carefully pack the perfect traveling outfit and collect
her make-up and toiletries from the bathroom counter.
"I
had the urge to get out of that house and get out of it fast!"
Julie,
perhaps a little less talk and a little more running for your life.
Lyle
may be a murderous loony, but he's no dummy. He removes a spark
plug from her car, making escape by vehicle impossible. So, Julie
must hitch a ride into town. She tries to call Cliff, but can see
from the phone booth that Lyle has followed her. Julie evades him
and makes her way to the Monterey police station. "Sergeant,
I want to report a murder," she cries.
Since
her former husband's case has been closed and she has no tangible
proof of Lyle's duplicitous nature, the police have very little
to work with. When Lyle is questioned he denies everything. It's
a frustrating case of he said, she said and there is nothing the
police can do. With Cliffs help, Julie checks into a San Francisco
hotel under an assumed name.
It's
not long before she receives a telephone call in her room. "Julie.
Julie, you're going to die."
"Lyle,
you're insane."
The
San Francisco PD can't do much either, but they're a touch more
sensitive to Julie's dilemma. "He admitted to killing my husband,
he admits that he wants to kill me, and nobody can help me do anything,"
she squeaks.
With
two officers and Cliff standing guard, Julie tries to sleep, "I
had the chilling sensation of being watched by Lyle. I could feel
his presence. It was ominous. It was strangely disturbing."
Julie
is awakened in the night to the menacing notes of a tape recorder
playing the same classical music that Lyle was rehearsing earlier.
Desperate to remain free of Lyle's psychotic clutches, Julie returns
to her former profession as a flight attendant and stays with a
fellow stewardess in her San Francisco apartment.
Meanwhile,
Lyle follows Cliff home from work one night. At gunpoint, he forces
Cliff to take him to Julie. Cliff leaps from the moving vehicle
in a bold attempt to escape and protect Julie's whereabouts. Lyle
shoots Cliff, rummages through his pockets, and finds the address
of the apartment where Julie is staying.
Though
mortally wounded, Cliff stumbles to a farmhouse and finds help.
He calls the police and they go to the apartment building to warn
her. Julie is gone. She's left for the airport, a last minute replacement
on an outgoing commuter flight. Skulking in the shadows, Lyle watches
Julie catch a cab to the airport terminal. He boards her flight
and manages to keep his presence a secret by hiding his face behind
a newspaper.
Midway
through the flight, San Francisco homicide calls, worried that Lyle
may have somehow learned of Julie's location. The only way to know
if he's on board is for Julie to identify him. "Be casual,"
the captain tells her, "everything depends on it." She
makes her way to the back of the cabin and then works her way forward,
trying to remain inconspicuous and identify Lyle from behind. Sure
enough, she recognizes the back of his brylcreamed head.
Considering
that Julie wouldn't shut up for the first half of the movie, this
would seem to be a perfect moment for yet another long-winded dramatic
voiceover, but now she's inexplicably silent. As Julie makes a mad
dash to the front of the plane, Lyle gains access to the cockpit.
Unbelievably, a Wild West shootout ensues. The pilot is killed and
Lyle is wounded. "I promised you it wouldn't be easy,"
he tells her, "You are going to be in this airplane, high in
the air, with nobody to fly it." With his dying breath he shoots
the co-pilot.
A
doctor on board proclaims the injury to be life threating. There
is only one person who can fly the plane. Guess who?
The
co-pilot turns the plane around in hopes that the radio tower in
San Francisco will be able to talk the plane down with Julie at
the controls. He gives her a few pointers before passing out. On
the ground, the macho guys at flight control give Julie instructions
while constantly referring to her as "Honey."
"I'm
terrified," she tells ground control as she brings the plane
into its approach pattern. While wringing all the pathos she can
out of the melodramatic scenario, she banks the plane left and then
right with all the finesse of the driving skills she demonstrated
earlier in the movie. Julie finally touches down… with her
eyes closed!
With
the plane safely on the ground, a look of relief passes over our
heroines face. The orchestra swells and the screen fades to black.
Not only has she saved herself and the passengers, but she has paved
the way for heroic flight attendants in future bad movies about
disaster-prone airliners.
The
drama for the character she played on screen was no match for what
Doris Day had to endure behind the scenes of Julie. In the
book, Doris Day: Her Own Story, she admits that wasn't particularly
interested in making Julie. Both her previous husbands had
been jealous of her success, so it's easy to understand why Day
would be reluctant to play a woman victimized by her husband's psychotic
jealousy. Day's husband Martin Melcher, who also produced the picture,
was finally able to talk her into taking the role.
During
filming, Day experienced severe abdominal pain. Her husband insisted
that she follow her Christian Science faith, forgo seeing a doctor,
and adhere to the films strict shooting schedule. After the movie
was completed, Day sought medical attention and found that she needed
major surgery to remove an endometriotic tumor.
Despite
all the turmoil, Day enjoyed shooting on location in Carmel so much
that she later made the California coastal community her home.
At
a time when most movies were still made on studio backlots and soundstages,
the extensive use of location filming during Julie set it
apart from other films of the time. Though real locations added
authenticity to a film, studio sets were still considered easier
to light and control. This may explain why shadows from the boom
mike and camera crew can be seen in nearly every scene of the film.
Julie
has all the ingredients necessary for a guaranteed bad movie classic.
Take one part Sleeping with the Enemy (1991) and one part
Airport 1975 (1974), add America's sweetheart and you've
got an overwrought, low-budget, woman-in-peril thriller that will
satisfy any fan of cool cinema trash.
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