Pedro Almodovar Apologizes to Meryl Streep for Shooting ‘Julieta’ in Spanish (Exclusive Video)
TheWrap Screening Series: “I felt very insecure about the language and the culture,” Oscar-winning director says
Spanish director Pedro Almodóvar, whose drama “Julieta” is competing in this year’s Oscar race for Best Foreign Language Film, felt the need to unburden himself after a Monday night screening of his new film.
[...] the filmmaker said he initially courted the three-time Oscar winner to play the lead in what would have been his first English-language movie.
The film stars Emma Suárez as the mature Julieta, who looks back on a chance meeting on a train when she was a young woman that changes her life forever and eventually leads to a separation from her beloved daughter.
Despite his work on 19 previous movies, Almodóvar told TheWrap awards editor Steve Pond that he became too insecure to set “Julieta” in an English-speaking landscape.
The director said he purposefully left out cliched dramatic scenes in his adaptation of Munro’s stories.
In one early scene, he skips showing a character’s death, instead focusing on the moment when the body is identified by a family member.
When it came to showing Julieta’s transition from young to old, the director also wanted to avoid CGI or any cinematic parlor tricks.