Julia, yes... Julie, not so much

We saw Julie and Julia last night.

Dinner was great, at a place called the Blue Plate...

[if I'm talking about dinner, what do you think my feeling as to the movie?]

It was a more-than-sold-out show... and the crowd was... OLD. I mean, really old.

OK, so... the movie...

For those who don't know, Julie and Julia is based on two true stories: the first of Julia Child (think of her as Rachel Ray before there was a Food Network... though I think she may have been closer to Alton Brown). The second is the story of Julia Powell, a temp worker in New York, who in 2002 set forth on the daunting prospect of cooking every one of over 500 recipes in Child's cookbook tome, Mastering the Art of French Cooking over the course of a single year... and to blog about her experiences.

If that mission sounds familiar, it's because I based the Bill / Shakespeare Project partly on it: for us, 36 plays in 36 months... I didn't want to rush to read all the plays in one year because I wanted to talk about each in depth.

Now, Julie's blog was turned into a book, and now this movie, or well, half this movie.

And at this point, I've got to warn you... I'm going to be spoiling the movie... so SPOILER ALERT.







So: SPOILER ALERT... you've been warned.







So the movie... as I hinted before, half the movie is based on the Julie Powell, the other on the life of Julia Child (or at least the 1945 through 1962 portion of it). And one half is much funnier, much more entertaining, and just plain better than the other.... and the good half is NOT Powell's half. Her story just didn't have... heft. It's not that her story isn't important, it is... it provides a wonderful counterpoint to what is happening to Julia in HER half. But Godfather, Part II this ain't... Meryl Streep is incredible, really channelling the six-foot-two chef (but comically so, not fully disappearing a la Sophie's Choice)... And her story is interesting. On the flip side, Amy Adams is fine. She is. And she's so damn cute. But her story, Julie's story, just can't match the Julia story.

The two stories and characters have some neat parallels... female government worker finds meaning in life through cooking... nice husbands... struggle to find fame/fulfillment. But here's the thing: I've read the first couple of chapters in the Powell book... it's a fun read, engaging and conversational. And it opens with a discussion of Powell's fertility (I believe still unused), and one of the film's interesting aspects is Julia's desire but seeming inability to have children (played as subtext in two very strong moments--one at the beginning of the film, as she and her husband Paul walk the streets of Paris, and she sees and for a moment is distracted by the sight of a baby carriage, the other about two-thirds of the way through the film when she breaks down after receiving a letter informing her that her sister, newly married, is now pregnant). It's good stuff, but the film completely ignores Julie's fertility. For a film that is trying to make parallels between the two women, it seems a bizarre lapse.

The two other lapses in storytelling also occur in the Julie storyline. There's a ridiculous (and by now pretty cliched) scene with Julie having lunch with her friends... they're all powerful women who must talk on their phones and use their PDAs at lunch, all while our cute Julie sits ignored (did I mention Amy Adams is soooooo cute?)... the other lapse occurs in the last ten minutes of the film. After Julie's blog wins her attention and offers of publication, she learns that Julia (now nearing 90) is NOT a fan of the blog. Julie goes into a bit of a tailspin over this, but then nothing comes of it (well, one thing: while she bemoans the situation, she's wearing nothing but her husband's shirt, showcasing her really nice legs and butt). So why bring it up at all? It could set up a possible conflict... or better yet, maybe a chance for the two to meet. But nothing happens. And it doesn't work... and it certainly doesn't help the end of the film, which feels flat.

Julie finishes the project, maybe gets published and visits the Julia exhibit at the Smithsonian. Julia gets published and receives a copy of her book arives in the mail. Fade to black. That's it. There's no resolution because there's nothing really to resolve. There's not a lot of conflict.

Julia's story, while fascinating, is not suspenseful. Ephron chooses to focus on her learning to cook and the writing of her cookbook... but since we know who she is, we know she publshed the book, we know she fnished the book... heck, if she didn't finish the book, the whole Julie section wouldn't exist. So there's no suspense.

And for the Julie story... there's really no suspense there, either. We're watching the movie that comes from her book, which wouldn't exist if she didn't accomplish her goal. The only sense of confict is a minor marital spat... but that's resolved pretty easily and NEVER felt like it would be anythng more that a movie contrivance.

I almost get the feelng that this is what happened: Nora Ephron gets the rights to this internet sensation and book by Julie Powell, but in the process of turning it into a screenplay realizes there's really no story there, so she begins a parallel story structure with Julia's story. But Julia's personality just overpowers everything else.

Don't get me wrong: it's not that I wasn't entertained. I was. I was just hoping for more.

It's not a great movie. I'm not sure it's even a good movie. But I did laugh. A lot. At half of it.

tonight

Julie and Julia in advanced screening at the American Cinematheque in Santa Monica.

Can't wait. The Julie/Julia Project was the launch pad for my own The Bill / Shakespeare Project. I like Nora Ephrom as a writer and a director. Meryl Streep is the finest actress of our generation.

And Amy Adams?



oooooh, baby... she's hot but so damned cute!

vampires do suck

hmmmm, I never thought about it this way, but maybe one my favorite shows of all time--Buffy the Vampire Slayer--is the reason why I find 99% of all the new wave of vampire pop (culture) boring, insipid... safe.

Read more HERE.

interesting, no?

sadness

this weekend we made an impromptu family trip to LA to do the tourist-y things we don't do since we live in the area. We stayed at the Bonaventure, rode those outside elevators, played at the pool, ate at Tito's Tacos (not as good as Lisa and I remember), went to LACMA, and saw G-Force at the El Cap (whoa, that's a bad movie).

At the LACMA, we checked out the Japanese art pavilion. Lot of emotion there, but I kept it under wraps... after we went to Little Tokyo... visited a shop with a lot of Ma memories... it was tough, but I didn't crack.

Yesterday, when we got back, I checked Facebook (yeah, I'm a little addicted, but at least I didn't take my laptop with us on the trip). A former student from Oxy had be-friended me about a month or so back, had told me how much my class meant to her, and had said that she was looking forward to the Shakespeare project. It was a very nice letter.

Last night, I had a message from my inbox from her account. Only it wasn't from her; it was from her husband, saying she had passed away on July 3, while in Arizona. I looked at her profile... it was heartbreaking:

XXX go to leave 2 help move and I have a flat....ugh. its so hot out and the day will drag. Missing my man ;(
July 2 at 3:09pm

then strand comments

FRIEND Where are you?
July 2 at 3:28pm

HUSBAND That sucks. Iv changed flats out there in 120 degrees. It not fun. LUVU. Baby.
July 2 at 6:18pm

FRIEND 2 lady when do you come home anyways?
July 2 at 11:15pm

XXX I am in Fort Mohave Arizon until this Sunday. We will have been here for 3 weeks. The time has gone fast but when it comes to the night and my man is not beside me it has been forever.
July 3 at 1:34am

FRIEND 2 I miss you TammyLoooo!!!!!!
July 7 at 9:54pm

Then, starting on July 4, comments of support for the husband on her passing, and posts of memories and condolences...


So last night, I responded to the message her husband sent:

I am so sorry to hear of her passing.

I lost my mom a few years back and it hit me hard... I don't know what I would do if I lost my Lisa. I hope you're doing OK.

I know we don't know each other, but if you need anything (even if it's just to vent and rant and purge the heaviness), please let me know... I'll do what I can.

Hang in there...

bw

I well up, but I'm not crying. That's a good sign, right? Maybe I can throttle down on the Wellbutrin... or not.

cannot. wait. for. football.

44th in the nation... I can live with that (just enough under the radar to sneak up on some folk)... exxxxxxcellent

Look Inside >>  July 22, 2009

Shakespeare: the Monster Mash-Up Edition

OK, don't know how many of you have heard of Seth Grahame-Smith's Pride and Prejudice and Zombies or his projected follow-up, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter, but now's there's another classic v. monster mash-up on the horizon:

Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters

So it's got me to thinking:

[What about a Shakespearean monster mash-up?]

Which play? What monster?

My wife Lisa's vote is for vampires (she's devoured the Twilight novels [though with less and less enthusiasm] as well was the Sookie Stackhouse novels by Charlaine Harris (the source for HBO's True Blood) and the Anita Blake, Vampire Hunter books by Laurell K. Hamilton), with maybe Friar Laurence being a blood sucker himself (the potion he gives Juliet is just to incapacitate her before he turns her... and when he finds Romeo in the chamber, he is touched by their romanticism and turns them both)... it might just work.

In "all my spare time," I might even play around with the idea...

ah, that Mary-Louise...

ah, you know I love me a little Mary-Louise Parker... but YOWZA...



Makes one hungry, don't it?

And if that wasn't enough to float my boat, as it were... Bruce-Tramps will enjoy THIS.

fall

about 30 min. ago, Pa fell.

He's not hurt (well, maybe his pride). I'm trying not to see too much into it, but he's not helping. He keeps using the term "my first fall" as if there will be many to come.

We may need to be a little more diligent keeping an eye on him...

christmas in july

ho

so funny, it's not even funny... oh, yeah, it is...

Things to say during sex...

kinda funny... on a couple of levels

ok, quick confession... always had a thing for Alicia Silverstone... something about that mouth...

My Mother's Red Hat w/Alicia Silverstone & Alanis Morissette from Alicia Silverstone

it's funny as a satire, but that title... red hat... heh heh

tired

stayed up way too late last night using the overripe bananas that were turning black to make bread... at least I know what's for breakfast.

Kyle went to see HP6 at midnight... I can only imagine how tired he'll be after water polo practice this morning (he's already there and it's 7 now)...

geeky giddiness

My OED (Oxford English Dictionary) on CD-ROM came yesterday... installed it last night... it totally rocks... I'm such a geek

CHROME

rocks... I'm loving the new google chrome browser... using it now...

getting out of dodge

headin' to LA for the weekend with Lisa...

cannot wait for tomorrow night...

typical

before heading out for a nice weekend away with Lisa, a little story from The Sporting News:



don't know what I find funnier,
the prospect yet another arrest for a trOJie (with no team-sanctioned punishment),
or
Carroll being "on vacation" when questions need answering...

how long will his vacation last with the NCAA sniffing around?

a confession

My parents, when I was but a wee English major at the best damn university in the world, bought for me the "compact" edition of the Oxford English Dictionary. It reduced every page of the 20-volume OED to one-quarter size, and put them into to two really heavy volumes. It came complete with magnifying glass... no lie.

Even with my glasses AND said magnifying glass, I can no longer read my copy of the OED.

The 20-volume set costs over $6200 in blue leather, and over a grand for basic hardcover. The online version is a $295 annual subscription. The CD-ROM is a single payment of $295.

Guess which one I just bought to help out with my Shakespeare project?

[hint, I won't need to pay but once, or make room on the bookshelf!]

both sides now... let's move on

Sharpton, shut your yap about a postage stamp for MJ... if it's meant to be, then it will happen after the proscribed 5-year waiting period.

Jackson family, do we really need ANOTHER memorial service in London next month? Really?

And Peter King, shut the hell up ... don't know whether the comments made this weekend were for a possible NY Senate run or something bigger in 2012 (fat freakin' chance, buddy), but your "pervert" and "low-life" statements made outside an American Legion hall were pure grandstanding...

Not that he doesn't have a point with which I agree: do I want the media blitz to be over? sure. Do I think he was a grade-A whackjob? Yeah... gotta cop to that. Do I wish the deaths of servicemen and -women (and cops, firefighters, etc [and teachers, too, King... you left them out, oh yeah, they don't fit into your blue-collar push]) were afforded the same kind of universal tribute? You bet your ass, and in a perfect world that would be the case. But this isn't a perfect world. In this imperfect world, Jackson was acquitted of the abuse charge, so let's tone down the "child molester... pedophile" statements, as if they were proven in a court of law.

All of this is a vain attempt for a second-rate politico to cash in on the public fascination of the items that matter not in the big scheme of things.

So can we put the Jackson stuff, both overblown, hyperbolic tributes and diatribes, into the coffin with him. Puh-lease...

WASPs

This is a GREAT story, lost from our history books about the Greatest Generation...

money pit?

OK, so we dropped the six grand (and now as I write this, I realize I didn't write about this earlier) last month to put in a new sewer line under the driveway and front yard... we've put off the Ace Duraflow for the time-being (another 9K just is too painful), but it's coming.

On Friday, we discovered mold in the closet. The LIAR, FR(uckh)E(a)D said it was our issue, as it's been over a year.

On Saturday, we found that one of our external outlets no longer work.

Last night, our bathroom toilet did the glub-glub-glub thing again (something that the first 800 outlay was supposed to fix).

Calls today to the plumber and electrician...

and why, exactly, did we buy a house? or rebuild a house?

catch-up

Macbeth rocked on Friday (full review is the theBillShakespeareProject.com podcast for this week.

The Fourth was nice... fairly mellow... great food and drink.

Yesterday took us to the beach (and my legs got sunburned... never took off my sweatshirt)... but last night I hit a wall and was in bed by 8pm.

And today, I've felt sicker than a dog (gastronomically) and lightheaded... may just curl up in bed here in a few... but I want to wait to hear how Jack's first day at writer's camp went...

oh, please, oh please ohpleaseoh

Look Inside >>  July 2, 2009

what odor?

is it just me or does Billy Mays sound like Chris Farley?

just close your eyes and listen...



it's like an SNL sketch...

I've rubbed myself with dog shit, a dead squirrel, fraternity boy vomit, then rubbed myself with a skunk, but one squirt of What Odor? and I smell like... well, nothing, because I now have no odor!

uh, right....