"Julie & Julia" is a movie about two women who are looking for something to do that they feel passionate about. Merle Streep is Julia Child in Paris in 1949. Her loving husband Paul is played by Stanley Tucci. He asks her, "what do you like to do?" Her answer is, "I like to eat!" That's it, she enrolls in Le Cordon Bleu culinary school.
Half the movie is spent 50 years later with Amy Adams as Julie Powell. She's an admirer of Julia Child and makes a commitment to herself to blog for 365 days, exploring "Mastering the Art of French Cooking." Her husband Eric (Chris Messina) encourages her in this project, enjoys many a good meal and takes lots of Tums!
It was fun for me seeing "Julie" posting to her blog. At one point she had an argument with her husband, posted about it, got it off her chest and then pressed the delete key. There are other scenes that, as bloggers, we can relate to.
There are so many wonderful moments in this movie, I'll just relate one. When Julia first attends the cooking class she has a difficult time slicing an onion. She was determined to show the men in the class she could do it better than they could.
There she was in her kitchen, chopping away, looked like she had chopped millions of onions. When her husband Paul entered the kitchen , he had to turn back, the odor was so strong! That was the one opportunity for Tucci to be funny, and it worked!
When she went to class, she beat all the men. Practice made perfect!
I've always enjoyed whatever Nora Ephron has done but this time she really cooked on all burners. The story was great, the cast was outstanding, the food looked wonderful ( I especially enjoyed the scene when the waiter was deboning a trout) That's exactly what the waiter did for me when I was in Paris.
Everyone in the cast did a fine job but I must say Meryl Streep made the movie. She was Julia in every way - her voice, her appearance and her expressions . An award coming up?
Once the movie was over (guess what) we went out to eat!!