together again on the big screen – sort of.
The movie this time around, "Julie & Julia," combines food, relationships
and writing, all of which are close to my heart (and tummy). That, along
with the appealing co-stars and an overdose of charm, accounts for why I
so enjoyed it during a preview screening Thursday night courtesy of the
Maryland Film Festival.
You'd also think it makes for a perfect chick flick, but wife Bonnie
Schupp wasn't as enamored and gave "J&J" a pair of downer digits. Her main
complaint: Insufficient conflict.
Well, we managed to disagree with each other on the ride home – but with
even less actual conflict than contained in the plot. She also felt it
dragged a bit.
But since this is my blog (and I do most of the cooking in our kitchen), I
get an extra vote. That's only fair.
In parallel story lines half a century apart, Streep playfully depicts the
mid-life period in which Child takes her first cooking lessons and embarks
with two friends on the book project that would help make her famous,
while Adams takes on the role of wannabe writer Julie Powell, who at the
suggestion of her husband begins blogging on a subject near to her heart:
Cooking.
And it's not just any kind of cooking, but taking on all 524 recipes in
Child and friends' famed "Mastering the Art of French Cooking," in 365
days.
Predictably, the blog gets some notice and by the end of the story, Julie
seems to be on her way toward a book deal, and Julia is last seen as a
copy of her own just-published book arrives in the mail. Two women – both
writers and cooks -- some 50 years apart, one channeling the other.
A few quibbles: What served for conflict between Julie and her husband
seemed contrived, and the setting of the last meal from the book – on a
rooftop with a magical million-dollar New York view – came a little out of
nowhere, given their bland 900-square-foot apartment on the floor above a
working-class neighborhood pizzaria.
Streep and Adams were last paired as nuns in the harder-hitting drama
"Doubt," focusing on suspected priestly sexual abuse of a young Catholic
boy. Bonnie and I also disagreed on that film – she liked it a lot, and I
was ambivalent. It was hardly a chick flick.
In their new film, written for the screen and directed by Nora Ephron,
Streep was amazingly believable as Julia, and Adams an appealing and
alluring 30-year-old Julie. I would have been thrilled to sit down at the
dinner table with either of them, but I'll settle for the movie. It was
just charming, and the world needs a little more of that these days.
Julie & Julia opens nationwide Aug. 7. I can only hope your theater offers
up some French pastries instead of the usual popcorn and butter-flavored
oil that doubtless would make both characters ill.
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