In JULIA, Tilda Swinton plays an alcoholic floozy who gets fired and decides to accept money to help her Mexican neighbor kidnap the son she's not allowed to visit. It only gets wilder after that, as the plot moves from Los Angeles to the California desert and then Tijuana, where the film becomes a violent action thriller.

It has been a long 10 years since French director Erick Zonka released his last theatrical feature: the magnificent, award-winning THE DREAMLIFE OF ANGELS. The follow-up, the English-language JULIA received only a token theatrical release in the US and is now available on DVD. The film was given a wide release in France where the critical reviews were very favorable (23 out of 25 reviews, as posted by Allocine.com, give the film 3 or 4 (maximum) stars). The US mainstream critical establishment barely took notice of the film with several publication assigning their third-string critics to review the film (most of their reviews are unfavorable). The film received enthusiastic to favorable reviews from the more reputable critics: Roger Ebert, Manohla Dargis, and Scott Foundas. Only Peter Rainer panned it.
Some quotes from their reviews:

"Tilda Swinton doesn't merely act the title role in French director Erick Zonca's Julia—she devours it, spits it back up, dances giddily upon it, twirls it in the air. It's a big, all-consuming performance, and in the hands of a lesser actress and filmmaker, it might have consumed the movie, too. But Julia is nearly as electric as its heroine, a leggy, vodka-guzzling tart in false eyelashes and cheap sequined gowns who tells men she can make their dreams come true, and who can, provided those dreams involve parking-lot sex and sunlight-blasted mornings after. The key to Swinton's performance (and to the movie) is that she's playing an actress—not a professional one, but a wily, desperate woman under the influence who adapts herself to what each new situation calls for, sometimes well, sometimes badly, but always with every fiber of her being." (Foundas)

"Tilda Swinton is a powerhouse actress who needs a director equipped to handle her power – i.e., someone with an ability not only to handle her highs but also to tone her down. In "Julia," the French director Erick Zonca lets Swinton swagger and sashay until she turns into a great big Actors Studio cartoon. Maybe it's because English is not Zonca's first language, but Swinton's performance, and practically everything else about "Julia," seems off – tone-deaf." (Rainer)

"There are about 20 minutes in her latest, "Julia," a venture in extreme acting and audience provocation in which she plays an alcoholic child-snatcher, when I wanted to split the theater. Directed by Erick Zonca, who seems to have signed a mutually assured destruction pact with his star, pushing her toward an abyss both might have fallen into, the film is a perverse blend of sadism (the director's, Julia's) and masochism (ours, Julia's). But Ms. Swinton demands to be seen even when her character is on a self-annihilating bender so real that you can almost smell the stink rising off her. So I sat in my seat, cursed the screen and was grateful to watch an actress at the height of her expressive power claw toward greatness." (Dargis)

"jULIA should have a big ad campaign and be making a lot of noise, stirring up word-of-mouth. It's being treated as an art film. It's good enough to be an art film, but don't let anyone pigeonhole it for you. It's one doozy of a great thriller. And the acting here is as good as it gets — not just from Swinton, but from Saul Rubinek as her one remaining friend, and by Bruno Bichir as Diego, who she meets in Tijuana. You want to be careful who you meet in Tijuana.
Swinton here is amazing. She goes for broke and wins big time. " (Ebert)