JULIE BABY

When a little girl gets called a whore for the first time, she discovers her place in the world but also her power to define herself.

Mother-daughter-sister relationships are front and center in this story about what it means to be a woman in the world and the complicated ways we try to protect the ones we love.
When all she wants is to be the center of attention on her birthday, instead Julie learns a piece of what it means to be a woman in the world. But she also discovers her power - to define herself and defend others. On a hot September day, Julie tags along after school to the bodega with her sister and gets caught in a domestic fight between a man and a woman. When the man calls the woman a whore and drags her out by her hair, Julie tries to save her but fails and loses her Birthday Girl crown in the struggle. Upon returning home, she discovers her mother just got broken up with and is drunk now, her sister is leaving that night, and there’s no chance her family is going roller skating for her birthday anymore. Dead set on being celebrated, Julie is left to play all of the cards in her hand to get herself a birthday. When a tender, playful exchange between sisters turns sour and Laura calls Julie a whore, Julie finally learns what the word means. She tries the word on for size alone playing dress up in the mirror and re-enacts the scene from the bodega upon herself.
As tensions between her mom and sister come to a head, Julie is again caught in the middle but this time with a powerful newfound understanding of herself she uses in service of others.
In the style of Andrea Arnold’s WASP and FISH TANK, JULIE BABY is a naturalist coming-of-age drama set in a lower class urban landscape filmed in Austin, TX.