What you’ve heard by now is true. Meryl Streep continues to show audiences that there will be a gaping void that no current American actress will be able to fill when she decides to stop making films. Will Meghan Fox or Rachel McAdams be making that charge into the valley? Unless Jennifer’s Body or The Time Traveler’s Wife becomes the Sophie’s Choice of our generation, I doubt it. Nora Ephron is competent and fairly skilled behind the camera. She switches between her two story arcs enough that we have a solid sense of the characters involved, but not so much as to induce motion sickness. There are beautiful shots of Europe and New York deli meats, and what appears to be real joy coloring each of the frames.
Amy Adams is cute without being entirely Hallmark-y (most of the time), and Meryl Streep surprises the audience by casting aside her Look-How-Funny-Julia-Child-can-be imitation and imbuing the woman who had a life apart from being a caricature with real emotion. Take a look at the scene where Julia Child receives a letter from her sister announcing her pregnancy to see how devastating Streep can be as an actress.
Weeks later, I still find myself disarmed by the film. Julie and Julia held up a mirror and showed me one cynical, jaded S.O.B. in the reflection. Wait, married people can be happy? They can have healthy sexual relationships, face difficulties and overcome them, and maintain their sense of individuality? People work and achieve success based on their dedication? Lives can end happily? But that can’t be true! I’ve seen Closer, The Secret Lives of Dentists, and the trailer for Revolutionary Road! I kept waiting for the bottom to fall out, for something horrible to happen in the narrative. Julia Child’s husband is locked up by McCarthy! Julie Powell gets a divorce! My eyes searched the screen for clues to this darker side, for the crumbs that would lead to an unhappy ending. Nope, nothing but rainbows and roses as far as the eye can see.
Even when Julie Powell has a “fight” with her husband that leads to him storming out and saying potentially hurtful things, the movie doesn’t skip a beat. With Henry Wolfe’s “Stop the Train” playing in the background (a more complicated song than the movie might advertise), Julie lives her life in a sped up what’s-it-like-without-my-husband montage. Apparently it involves blogging. It won’t ruin the plot by telling you that he does return and says the one romantic line that all girls want to hear: “So what’s for dinner?” I can’t wait to use that line on my loved one.
The movie has moments of real humor and as awkward as it is to see Stanley Tucci make out with Meryl Streep, actual romance. There are indeed worse movies to be dragged to by (I mean with!) your significant other. A brief warning. Don’t watch this movie if you’re single and not happy to be as the constant canoodling and happiness in the film will leave you on the couch double fisting Maker’s Mark and Cherry Garcia while watching Casablanca in the dark. Why can everyone find the love of their life but meeeeeeeeee?
For a movie about Julia Child, one of the most famous cooks in the world, and Powell, who began her own blog about cooking, there seems to be a real lack of food preparation in the film. Powell fails a few times in her culinary travails which are the dramatic high points in terms of her narrative, and Child is really good at chopping onions, but we see very little of Child’s cooking methods or what set her apart from thousands of cooks around the globe (besides being a 6-foot-two tall female).
In a world of economic downturn, endless wars, and Tool Academy 2, Julie and Julia lends its audience a brief respite and a reminder of what happiness looks like which is a valiant endeavor. The highest praise a critic can really make about a movie is that people should watch it, and most people should watch Julie and Julia. Ultimately, however, the film’s greatest strength is also its greatest weakness. Nice guys finish last for a reason (awwwww), and so do nice movies. They’re fine as far as the wind blows, but they’re not interesting enough for a second glance.
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Weird man, actually just saw this last night. I don't have as much nice things to say. For me it was a little long and there seemed to be filler in there where they could have put some more meat. There were a lot of plot threads and it did not seem everything was tied up as neatly as the duck at the end of the film. I left feeling that there was a lot left on the cutting room floor to get the movie down to 2 hours; unfortunately, they left in about 15 minutes of letter opening suspense. "Look Paul, a letter, addressed to me! It is a letter and look at who it is addressed to...me! I should open it. I am opening it. It is written to me!"
ReplyDeleteJenn brought up a good point that it was a very solid Julia Child bio movie. I would go one step further and say that if they were to have done away with the entire Julie plot I would have liked it more.
Lastly, when anyone else sees this movie notice how weirdly quasi-political it gets at times. A lot of McCarthy mentioning and a truly bizzare bit of dialogue from Julie's boss late in the movie.
That's it. I'm enjoying the blog. Any chance we can get a rating system from you? I don't want to read a review if it is going to be a movie I will see.