Entertainment Monday: Julie & Julia ( 1 February 2016)

Julie and Julia feature two true stories. In 2002, a young office worker named Julie Powell (played by Amy Adams) attempts to cook all of 524 recipes from Julia Child’s revolutionary cookbook, Mastering the Art of French Cooking in one year. Julie kept a blog on her endeavors which became very popular and eventually a book and movie were made about her adventures in cooking.

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The other true story starts in the 1950s, with Julia Child (Meryl Streep) living with her husband Paul Cushing Child (Stanley Tucci) in Paris. Julia decides she must have a hobby so she learns French cooking. Later, Julia and her friends Simca Beck (Linda Emond) and Louisette Bertholle (Helen Carey) decide that they want to write a French cookbook for American household cooks.

I felt that Julia Child’s story about getting her manuscript published was more interesting than Julie Powell’s attempts to cook everything in the book.  It was Julia’s charm and the beautiful Parisian landscape that won me over. I was charmed over Meryl Streep’s portrayal of Julia Child. I didn’t know anything about Juila Child before watching the movie but I was enchanted with her cheerful and energetic spirit, her love of food and the passion she had for her husband. It is known that Julia and Paul Child were very in love with each other and he was supportive of her writing a cookbook. Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci had good chemistry and it looked like they were a real married couple.

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I could relate to Julie’s life as well. She was about to turn thirty and in a very stressful job which did not give her fulfillment. Julie turns to cooking to gather some meaning in her life.  She relates on how her mother cooked one of the recipes from Mastering the Art of French cooking and describing the taste as magical.

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 I’m currently 29 years old and still trying to establish my career while trying to have a work/life balance and finding meaning in my life.  We’re both bloggers so I could understand her struggle with how much to reveal about her personal life.  Julie’s blog existed when blogging was still a new thing and so was publishing novel goals that I found it amusing when she had to explain blogging and why she was cooking. In the movie, Julie doesn’t take any photos of her food for her blog which I found unusual because I thought she should show proof of her cooking endeavors. Maybe she did and it wasn’t featured in the movie or maybe it wasn’t important in those times. Nowadays, a blogger would have posted pictures on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter and made a video for Youtube. Julie Powell’s blog has since been deleted so I can’t account for it.

This is a lovely film to watch with your foodie friends. The film will have you drooling for French cooking. The movie is a bit sexual though which may not be appropriate for some families. Julia and Julie both have loving relationships with their husbands. There’s nothing graphic of course, just some making out before they go off to bed and it cuts away from there. I hope you enjoy the film as much as I did.