Julie & Julia

Movie: Julie & Julia

I saw it on: August 10, 2009

Cast: Meryl Streep, Amy Adams, Stanley Tucci, Chris Messina, Linda Emond

Genres: Comedy

Synopsis: Amy Adams plays Julie - a city employee.  Her job seemed to consist of dealing with people angry about the 9/11 memorial.  She and her husband have just moved into a small apartment.  She is approaching 30 and frustrated that her friends seem to be much more successful than she.  Julie loves cooking, so to give herself a goal in life, she decides to cook all 524 recipes in Julia Child’s “Mastering the Art of French Cooking” in one year – and to blog about it.

The movie alternates between following Julie’s quest and flashing back to the 1950’s and 50’s when Julia Child lived in Paris.  It was during this period that Julia Child went to the Cordon Bleu – apparently one of the first women to do so.  Her love of cooking led Julia Child to write the first English language cookbook on French Cooking.

My two cents:

I am a big fan of both Amy Adams and Meryl Streep, so I was pretty sure I would like the movie. And I did.  What I did not realize is how little I knew about Julia Child.  I had no idea she was married to a diplomat.  Her husband was actually sucked into the McCarthy era frenzy and was almost fired.  I got a big charge out of watching the enthusiasm of both Julie and Julia in their love of cooking.

All the cooking got me so charged up that twenty minutes after I got home from the movie; I had ordered Mastering the Art of French Cooking from Amazon.