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List Price: $28.96 | | Label: Sony Pictures
Salesrank: 8
Released: December 8, 2009 |
| Our Price: $15.98 |
| Used Price: $14.49 |
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MPAA Rating: PG-13 (Parental Guidance Suggested)
Media: DVD |
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Editorial Review:
JULIA CHILD'S STORY OF HER START IN THE COOKING PROFESSION IS INTERTWINED WITH BLOGGER JULIE POWELL'S 2002 CHALLENGE TO COOK ALL THE RECIPES IN CHILD'S FIRST BOOK.
Description of Julie & Julia:
Julie & Julia is a film that should be relished with gusto--accompanied by the freshest and best ingredients, pounds of butter, and bottles of the very best wine. It lovingly celebrates the life of one of American food's most influential and beloved figureheads: Julia Child--played here with zest, humor, and a sweet, subtle respect by Meryl Streep, whose performance is spectacular.
Julie & Julia is based on the book by Julie Powell, a frustrated New York bureaucrat who wants to be a writer. "But you're not a writer until someone publishes you," she moans. So she gives herself a challenge: to cook her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking in one year, and to blog about it. As Powell (played with chirpy determination by Amy Adams), begins to find her groove as a cook, and her voice as a writer, the project takes on a life of its own--and in the end it does provide the struggling young woman with her life's purpose, to her very pleasant surprise. But mostly, Julie & Julia is a valentine to Child, to Child's amazing love affair with her dashing husband, Paul (Stanley Tucci, as divine as any soufflé in the film), and to her outlook on embracing life, and ordering seconds. Streep throws herself into the Child role with real affection for her character, and while certain of Child's idiosyncrasies--including her warbly voice and unflappable haphazardness in the kitchen--are retained, it's Child's character and vision which form Streep's portrayal, and which make the film so involving and rewarding.
Nora Ephron directs with deftness and a light touch, though she seems at times to be encouraging some of Meg Ryan's onscreen tics in Adams (the self-conscious head tilt, for one). But mostly she simply allows Streep to channel Child and her love of food, her husband, and 1950s Paris. And that is a recipe for something truly sublime. --A.T. Hurley
Julie & Julia Reviews:
A sleeper 
2009-12-18 - Having never seen Julia child, I thought this would be interesting. However, it centers on Julie who turns out to be a big bore! I actually slept through most of it, offered it to friends, who very promptly turned it down! Guess I will send it to the nearest thrift shop!
Sleepless in the kitchen... 
2009-12-18 - Gawd, who buys this junk? OK, Meryl does good schtick, SNL style, but while her Julia Child sounds pretty right, she acts wrong, it's a paper-thin impression, with Julia coming off as a fausse grande-dame from a PG Wodehouse story, too too stuffy & tweety. The Queens part of the story is deadeningly dull dull dull.
Wonderful and Delightful 
2009-12-17 - This is such a darling movie and I highly recommend it. This is a keeper. I adore Meryl Streep in this. She is great !! This is a sweet story and anyone would love this movie. I'd give it ten stars if I could. This movie is a must-see.
Fallen Souffle 
2009-12-16 - This movie is a sad disappointment. In case you haven't heard (and if you are reading this review at all, you probably have heard), it's based on Julia Child's memoir "My Life in France" and Julie Powell's blog and book about making the 524 recipes in "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" over the course of a year.
I gave it three stars because:
1. of Meryl Streep's delightful incarnation of the late, great Julia Child
2. you can't go wrong filming in Paris
3. it was reasonably engaging for me--but I'm a francophile foodie and Julia's "French Chef" show on PBS in the 1960s changed my Anglo-Irish meat and potatoes culinary world forever
4. when Julia receives a letter from a prospective publisher at her home in Cambridge, Mass., circa 1960, the filmmakers show the envelope with a two-digit postal code rather than a ZIP code
5. they include Dan Ackroyd's Julia Child skit from Saturday Night Live
6. it reminds me not to crowd the mushrooms.
Now the weaknesses:
1. The Julie Powell character (well-played by Amy Adams) is self-absorbed and tedious and you wonder why her husband loves her; heck, you're not even sure why the cat hangs around
2. The Paul Child character is underdeveloped and although you see that Julia loves him dearly, you can't figure out quite why
3. It does not have enough drama for a drama, and it does not have enough jokes for a comedy
4. They don' show the clip of Julia taking a blowtorch to creme brulee on Letterman
5. How can a story about such a larger-than-life person feel so Cinderella-story-formulaic and pedestrian?
For a movie about haute cuisine, it leaves me feeling about as satisfied as a trip through the Burger King drive-up window. Still, if even one person who sees "Julie & Julia" recycles Rachael Ray and buys, studies, and gets the courage to start cooking with "Mastering the Art . . . " instead, it will have been worth it. On a rainy weekend when you've got time, butter and sugar on hand to survive a few mistakes, try the tarte tatin. Don't be discouraged if you burn the sugar the first few times out--you'll get the hang of it.
Soooo disappointed...
2009-12-16 - I made the mistake of reading the book before I saw the movie. While the Julia Child parts of the film were magical -- thus three stars -- with Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci (and their entire supporting cast!) turning out beautiful work, the powers-that-be succeeded in gutting the Julie Powell storyline, taking a brilliantly witty woman and turning her into an unsympathetic, whiny, narcissistic little twit onscreen. As other reviewers mentioned, I found myself becoming more and more impatient to get back to the Julia storyline -- so much so, that I began to fast-forward through the Julie parts. I do understand the need to edit down the vast number of scenes in the book (or we would end up with a movie 10 hours long), but Julie Powell deserved so much more -- this film is not a fair representation of who she is, by a long shot. It was as if all of the creative energy was funnelled into the Julia scenes, and Julie Powell was simply an afterthought. The other frustrating part is that I would have really loved to have seen a full-length movie centered completely around Julia Child with the same cast of characters -- they were cast perfectly -- but I suppose this movie cancels out the possibility of that ever happening.
