Libramedi
Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant
Rio Hayward
All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.
Abegail Noëlle
While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.
Horst in Translation (filmreviews@web.de)
"Im Juli." (don't forget the full stop) is an early Faith Akin film starring two young German actors Moritz Bleibtreu and Christiane Paul, both still under 30 years old. Bleibtreu won the German Film Award for his work here and in "Das Experiment". Not too big on Paul usually, but I thought she gave a decent performance here, even if I found Idil Üner 10 times as attractive as her. And Mehmert Kurtulus plays a character whose story I found almost more interesting than the one from Bleibtreu's character. Sadly, we only find out the very basics about him. Initially, he seems like a contract killer with a corpse in the trunk of his car, but things are not always what they seem. For Akin, it was sort of an early breakthrough film, not as big as "Gegen die Wand, but still pretty successful.The film's big strength is the writing. Akin did a fine job here. There are only very few scenes when it is off the mark, for example the border scene that features Akin himself in a cameo as a border official. The whole marriage reference is slightly cheesy as are the words that Bleibtreu's character says to Juli at the end. On a side-note, somehow I always felt that Juli would not be attracted to a nice looking guy like Bleibtreu's character. Anyway, back to the writing. The whole bridge part was pretty genius. That he intended to go there to meet the one girl first, but finally the other girl. I also liked that when he sees Juli from behind it was the typical scene that it could turn out to be somebody else in a comedic fashion, but here it was actually her. We see the transformation in Bleibtreu's mind who's the right one for him when the Turkish girl sees him, holds his eyes and he asks if it is Juli, because by that point Juli is already the one he wants. The sun reference early on was nicely done as well. But it won't work with him if she tries to force it as he sees another girl with a sun first. They need to get to know each other first on their journey.The supporting cast is decent too. I won't list the names, you can check the cast list for that, but a few of them have worked with Akin before or afterward (especially Bleibtreu several times) and most of them are at least familiar faces to those with an interest in German cinema. The pub brawl scene with Jochen Nickel (okay, now I named one) was one of my favorite scenes. The Russian criminal girl scenes, however, I did not like as much. All in all, I recommend this movie, even if its ending was as cheesy as expected. If you like it, take a look at "The Sure Thing" starring John Cusack. There's quite a few parallels.
maaey
Im Juli is one of the ultimate adventurous love movies. I personally love most of the movies Moritz Bleibtreu movies but Juli played by Christiane Paul totally sets the mysterious free spirited feeling throughout the movie. Overall exceptionally good acting and storyline! From the beginning to the end of the movie, everything was unexpected to me. I experienced a wide range of emotions throughout the movie. Im Juli goes from adventure, to intense, to perfect love story, to lives falling apart and lives being lost. But within the final ending minutes everything throughout the movie came together, which left me completely satisfied.
asenkron
Im Juli,as a Faith Akin production,it must be seen by the people who question that "how to find right person".This film shows us that a girl or boy who we never think to date could be most special person in the world.In the other words,in contrast to Daniel looking for love in far away,Romeo or Juliet may be close as a car seat.Daniel goes thousands of kilometers for the sake of love that he believe her as right person.The ring that Juli sold to Daniel is the sign of Juli's hope for love to him.But this expectation disappears in front of the bar that Juli hope to see Daniel there.Certainly She sees him there but with a girl who let the story starts.The facts that based on characters Melek,Daniel,Juli and İsa are significant.No comment more,just watch it without hesitating...
MartinHafer
This was a sweet comedy that provided lots of entertainment with only a few wrong turns. First the wrong turns. I wasn't exactly thrilled by the notion that the overly controlled school teacher needed to loosen up by smoking some pot. Also, it seemed relatively easy to determine WHO the main character would fall in love with in the end of the film after only shortly after the movie began. HOWEVER, despite these minor problems, I really liked this film. The acting and pacing were excellent and although you had a strong idea where the movie would end, the actually journey there took a lot of surprising twists and turns. The end result is an excellent "chick flick" that will please both men and women alike.