Julie & Julia (2009, U.S.)

Nora Ephron is the queen of women's interest classy comedy. Truly. Julia Child is a loud, opinionated, unusual American in France who wants to cook. And 50 years later, Julie Powell is a depressed, unfulfilled woman living in New York who decides to cook through Child's cookbook in a year. The only thing that makes this story better is the fact that it's true. Fascinating.

Meryl Streep and Amy Adams both have a comedic gift. Combined, it was almost too much. Hilarious. Their screen spouses also had great chemistry with them.

I also liked the way the two stories were blended together. They paralleled and complemented each other, but they could also stand alone quite easily.

Good comedy plus unique and engaging history is a neat combination. Combined with good acting, good sets, a good score (by Alexandre Desplat, one of my favorites!), and good scripting, it was really worth watching.

One little thing that bothered me was Julie finding out that Julia didn't like her blog. However, she drops that bomb and then it's never mentioned again. I just don't understand it, and it nearly ruined the ending for me. Still, I thought the last shot closed the movie exactly right.

Rating: 3.5

Like Water for Chocolate / Como agua para chocolate (1992, Mexico)

Blockbuster loves to recommend movies to me, and sometimes I'll listen, like in this case. After all, how many times did I shelf the novel this film was based on when I worked at GCPL? Also, new foreign film is always nice.

I had mixed reactions to this one. On one hand, it had a really great love story with a twist—very dependent on Mexican culture. The main character falls in love with a man, but because she is the youngest daughter, she must never marry but instead care for her mother until her mother's death. So the man marries her sister to stay close to her. I'm not sure whether that's romantic or messed up, but there you go.

Decades of heartache and drama ensue. One sister runs off with the Mexican revolutionaries, one is married to the other's one true love, and the third tries to forget her heartache through cooking. So while most of the story was quite good, I feel like the cooking was supposed to be a lot more central to the plot. The main character was born on the kitchen table, after all. She does make everyone sad when she cries in the batter of her sister's wedding cake, then she makes everyone horny when she cooks a dish with roses that the man brings her, but otherwise, food takes a backseat to the rest of the story. I believe it was probably more integral in the book, like it was in the film Eat Drink Man Woman.

Overall, it really is a good film. The family drama, the romance, the food, the insight into early 20th century Mexican culture. I especially loved the ending and the use of magical realism throughout. In fact, I think I will start looking for more films that employ magical realism. And I would recommend this, even though I've only given it a mediocre rating.

Rating: 3.5