Kim's Thoughts

Julie & Julia was a much anticipated movie for me!  Right from the first clip I saw many months ago as a preview in another movie I was seeing….I was sure this was going to be a winner!  How could it not be?  It had everything:  Meryl Streep, who I love and strongly believe is incapable of a bad performance; Amy Adams, who I think is simply adorable and a delightful actress; Stanley Tucci, who I adore – what a marvelous character actor; Nora Ephron, who’s movies have always ended up on my “loved them” list; blog theme, well, you know I love blogs; food theme, ditto!  It was a sure bet!

All the elements I mentioned above were there and each one did live up to my expectations!  So, why did the movie fall flat for me?  How can a movie with everything going for it not come together as a perfect whole?  Well, I’m not really sure how it happened, but it did!  But, to say it was a total disappointment is not true, either.  So, I’ll break it down….

This is a movie based on TWO life stories and is told as TWO separate stories in TWO separate eras on TWO separate continents……and, in my opinion, they should have made it into TWO separate movies.  They intertwined them and it didn’t work!  The two just didn’t mix.  It might have been different if the two women were to come together at some point – meet and physically connect somehow, but they don’t, other than a brief mention that Julia may or may not have made some comment in an interview that a publisher heard about that implied she didn’t like that Julie was capitalizing on her.

The “Julia” part:  Meryl Streep is incredible (of course) as food icon Julia Child during her time living in post WWII France with her husband, Paul.  Paul is played by the wonderful Stanley Tucci.  Both characters are colorful and enduring.  Streep and Tucci have a fascinating chemistry that worked great in “Devil Wears Prada” and is even stronger as Julia and Paul Child.  They brought the characters to life and did them true justice!  They were the best part of the movie.  I found myself instantly paying closer attention and sitting up straighter whenever the scenes about Julia’s life began.  The telling of Julia’s attempt to find herself that brought her to decide to build on her love of food and attend the famed Cordon Bleu culinary arts school was interesting and funny.  The same can be said about how she got her start as a writer.  The relationships in her life – her husband, her sister, her co-authors in France, and a life long pen pal that she finally meets on a trip to the US to visit a publisher are all genuine and speak volumes to her character.  I would have loved to have had the whole movie devoted just to Julia’s life so they could expand on several aspects they only briefly eluded to.  Like, for instance:  there were at least two scenes where Julia got extremely emotional about seeing a baby or hearing of a dear friend being pregnant.  I got the impression that she couldn’t have children of her own – perhaps a deeper dive into her relationship with her beloved husband might have provided a touching aspect to the story line.  It would have been interesting to also get more information on the impact of the McCarthy Era on Paul Child and their life together – there was a lot of reference to their political views and Paul was called to Washington where he was investigated.  I really think there is a full two hour movie in there and that they missed out on a wonderful opportunity by cutting it so short and mingling it with another story.

The “Julie” part:  Amy Adams portrayed Julie Powell, a budding author who just couldn’t seem to get published.  She decides to just write for herself by starting a blog devoted to cooking her way through Julia Child’s “The Art of French Cooking” cookbook and her experiences along the way.  Sounds like a great blog and like a really cool concept for a movie.  But, for me, it was an annoying distraction to the “Julia” part.  Amy Adams is adorable and brings a lot to her character – that’s not the problem – the problem was the story and the other characters.  There were some really funny scenes – like when she has to touch and kill live lobsters for the first time in her life and scenes where, despite following the recipe and instructions to the letter, the food still did not turn out well at all!  But, for the most part, the scenes felt rushed and incomplete.  The most irritating part for me was watching her, her husband, and her friends eating!  They ate like pigs that were on the verge of starving to death and were given a meal that may be their last one ever!  They rapidly crammed more food in their mouth than could fit in one bite, chewed with their mouths wide open, and laughed and talked with their mouths crammed full while they continued to cram more in!  It was disgusting to watch!!!  Yes, I know, they were trying to convince us that they were in ecstasy over the wonderful food Julie cooked for them — but, you can show how much you love the food without being obnoxious about it!  The scenes in the “Julia” part where Julia and Paul were savoring some wonderful offering of French cuisine told it all in the looks on their faces and the joy in their eyes!  Overall, the “Julie” part had a couple brief moments of viewing pleasure, but it was fragmented and could have been left on the cutting room floor with little impact to the rest of the movie (except that the title wouldn’t have made much sense….).

Again – I would have liked the movie much more if it had dropped the “Julie” part and expanded a lot more on the “Julia” part.  Putting them together just didn’t work – they didn’t meld at all and didn’t even do much to compliment each other.

Rating:

The Julia part:     A

The Julie part:    D+

All together:        C+

Too bad they will probably never go back and take advantage of the missed opportunity to make a full feature film with Meryl Streep as Julia Child and tell the whole story!  Now that is a movie I would really enjoy seeing!

I took in the 5:10 showing of The Ugly Truth this weekend.  This is a romantic comedy starring Katherine Heigl (Gray’s Anatomy) and Gerard Butler (PS I Love You, 2007).

Heigl portrays Abby Ritcher, a neurotic control freak who is looking for the perfect mate by matching prospective suitors to a checklist of desired qualities.  She is also the producer of a local morning show that is struggling with ratings.  To raise ratings, her bosses bring on Butler’s character, Mike Chadway, and his “The Ugly Truth” segment to spice up the show.  Chadway’s local cable show focuses on telling the ugly truth about the relationships between men and women – he is crude and obnoxious, but has a huge fan following.  Of course, he immediately rubs Abby the wrong way and a series of hysterical interchanges ensue – Abby is bound and determined to prove to him that his outlook is totally wrong and he sticks to his guns by pointing out why her approach is exactly why she is still single with a cat for a room mate! 

Enter Abby’s new neighbor — an absolutely drop dead gorgeous doctor played by former model Eric Winter who she soon finds out meets 9 out of 10 points on her check list!  Abby is well on her way to ruining her chances with the Doc with her enthusiasm.  Mike notices and when she tries to show him that the perfect man DOES exist, he talks her into taking his dating advice.  She does and it WORKS! 

The interactions and relationships between the three and the morning show back drop make for a very funny movie!  There are at least two scenes that are so funny they can be described as “laughed out loud, tears ran down my cheeks, all I could do to keep from peeing my pants” hysterical!!!  There were other laugh out loud scenes, as well — but those two are worth the price of admission alone!  Abby and Mike also discover they both have another side that shows them they have more in common than meets the eye, which creates a major conflict in their goals to prove each other wrong!

Overall, the movie was very funny and enjoyable.  The part I thought didn’t fit was that they had Abby stooping to Mike’s level in a way that just didn’t make a lot of sense.  She also over-did the “desperate love sick” female bit.  BUT – both those downfalls made for good comedy – so I was torn as to whether or not to take points off for them.

I recommend this movie if you want to laugh and if you just want to be entertained.  HOWEVER – if you take offense in blatant sexual innuendo and sexual comedy, this movie may not be for you and I would recommend some caution if you plan to take young children with you.  I give this one a solid B and recommend it for a fun date movie!

Now – on a side note – I usually go to the matinee shows because it really irritates me to pay full price for a movie!  Yesterday I planned to go to the 12:45 show, but got tied up with some things and didn’t make it.  So, I went home and did some things waiting for the 3:10 show, but relaxed and ended up falling into a little nap and missed that one, too!  I went to the 5:10 show, which is the first of the full price time slots of the evening.  I was shocked and very disappointed to find that Spring Lane Cinemas has raised their prices to $9.00 a ticket!  That is just way too much!  The matinee price also went up to $6.75.  Actually, all their prices were increased 25 cents.  25 cents doesn’t sound like much, but if you take a family of 4, that is a dollar more than it cost you before — which was already pretty high!  So — I give Spring Lane Cinemas a big THUMBS DOWN for raising prices in this economy for families that are already struggling to find affordable entertainment choices!

My bad — I have seen THREE movies in the last three weeks and haven’t written reviews on any of them!!!  So — in an effort to catch up before I make it FOUR that I am behind on, here are reviews for My Sister’s Keeper, The Proposal, and Public Enemies (wow – talk about three very different movies!) – in the order I saw them (and, coincidentally, also in the order I ranked them):

First is My Sister’s Keeper.  This movie stars Cameron Diaz as Sara Fitzgerald, a mother who discovers her two year old daughter, Kate,  is going to die of cancer.  Neither parent nor their son are matches for the treatments Kate needs to survive.  On the off the record advice from their doctor,   the Fitzgeralds go through the process of conceiving another child – one that is genetically engineered to be a perfect match for Kate.  Abigail Breslin portrays Anna – Kate’s life line!  Anna’s whole purpose of being is to provide organs, blood, and bone marrow to her sister to keep her alive.  As the girls enter their teen years, Anna contacts a publicity hound lawyer, played by Alec Baldwin, to sue her parents for medical emancipation.  This action immediately rips the family apart and creates emotional turmoil for all.  It also raises moral and ethical questions on multiple levels!  Another standout character is Judge DeSalvo, exceptionally portrayed by Joan Cuzack.  The judge recently returned from a long leave of absence after a break down caused by the accidental death of her own teen-aged daughter.  The relationships between all the characters intertwine and meld beautifully.  The siblings – Kate, Anna, and brother Jesse – are close nit.  In particular, the bond between Kate and Anna is amazingly close.  The Judge’s compassion for the Fitzgerald’s situation results in an emotional roller coaster for her that is felt by all.  Campbell Alexander – the lawyer – also suffers from a disability that strips him of control over his own body.  So he, too, is emotionally connected to young Anna.  The movie is incredibly emotional and heart wrenching – watching a lovely young girl become more and more ill and close to death – watching the personal torture Anna goes through as she is torn between her deep love and sense of duty for her sister and her desire to have control over what happens to her own body – watching the parent’s hearts breaking over the inevitable loss of one daughter and the conflict of what to think about the other daughter – watching the judge desperately try to keep her recent tragedy aside as she deals with the case before her………….all actors are incredible in their roles and the story is told impeccably.  Take a whole box of tissues or a HUGE stack of napkins in with you — you’ll need them!!  I highly recommend this movie – it will give you a lot to think about!   I rate this one a solid A+!

Next is The Proposal.  How can you go wrong with Sandra Bullock?  I don’t think I have ever seen her in a movie that I didn’t like on some level!  This was no exception.  In this particular romantic comedy, she plays a high powered book editor at a major publishing company in NY City.  Margaret Tate is a “Devil Wears Prada” type editor – she is a ruthless executive who is hated and feared by all, but she is much more obvious and loud about it.  Her self centered “all about me” attitude about everything she does results in her facing deportation to her native country – Canada!  In a split second decision, she blackmails her assistant – Andrew (played by Ryan Reynolds) – into going along with an announcement that they are engaged to be married so that she can get a “fiance visa”!  A weekend at Andrew’s parent’s home in Alaska and a suspicious immigration agent set the stage for hilarious situations and the potential for Margaret to show her real self – as well as to provide fuel for real love to develop!  This is a very funny movie – Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds have great chemistry and are convincing in their roles.  I thoroughly enjoyed this movie and recommend it for all you romantic comedy fans and any guys who are looking for a good chick flick to rack up some extra brownie points to impress your date!  I rate this one an A-!

And finally, we have Public Enemies.  This movie stars Johnny Depp — need I say more????  He was fantastic as gangster John Dillinger – the FBI’s Public Enemy # 1 for much of the depression era years.  The movie follows the last couple of years of Dillinger’s life and adventures in crime.  It portrays his wild side – his love of women and flamboyance;  his softer side – his relationship with girlfriend, Billie, and his deep caring for the members of his gang;  and his gangster side – his elaborate jail breaks, his adventurous bank robberies, and his connections to Chicago Mafia head Frank Nitti.  I love a good gangster movie and this, for the most part, didn’t disappoint me!  Depp was perfect in the role of Dillinger!  I was a little disappointed in Christian Bale’s portrayal of FBI agent, Melvin Purvis.  Purvis was the charismatic, good looking movie star type who made a name for himself as being the agent who shot Pretty Boy Floyd.  On the heels of that fame, he was assigned to focus all of his attention on getting John Dillinger!  The cat and mouse game that ensued between Purvis and Dillinger is legendary – Dillinger was always one step ahead of Purvis and he just didn’t have what it took to get close enough to get the job done!  I thought the movie did a good job of showing that, but I thought it was lacking something – not sure what, but I thought that whole piece could have been a little more exciting!  I also thought Christian Bale’s portrayal of Purvis was a little flat — it didn’t feel right — like it was forced and not natural for him.  That didn’t ruin the movie, though — it just left me thinking that something was a little “off”.  Overall, the movie was very good — I enjoyed it and definitely recommend it for anyone who likes gangster movies and especially for anyone who likes Johnny Depp!!!  I rate this one a B+++!

See you at the movies!