Finished Julie & Julia…at last! I had begun on quite an upbeat mood…things went horribly wrong in the middle. Well, not horribly wrong really…but a little wrong (I am faintly in love with hyperboles).
Julia Child, I agree, must have been a great cook. Her book therefore I’m sure, must have been quite awe-inspiring. Or so says Julie Powell...in Julie & Julia. But where’s the inspiration for the reader?
Am I supposed to believe that a thirty-something woman, cooking up 500 recipes in 365 days is bigger than issues in Afghanistan? Or is it that American women have such inconsequential things to bother about, so much so that some wisecrack actually makes a whole goddamned Hollywood movie out of it?
I mean come on! (Yes, I have been mind numbingly blatant and politically incorrect here…but the reader deserves a break!) Sure my vocabulary is a wee bit richer now…thanks to cool phrases like ‘a stratospheric fuck’. But is that what a true blue reader reads a book for? In these mad times when you are hankering for some inspiration, is this the best that Julie Powell can come up with? Not that she is expected to be a Jane Austen or even a Helen Fielding…but excuse you me!
Don’t get me completely wrong here. I mean, the book has its moments…funny anecdotes and comfort notes for aging women who feel hapless and vapid most of their waking hours. But is that all that a book should be?
Maybe I should have written about this a month later. The bitterness would have subsided by then. Right now, I could go on and on about how pointless the book is, and how painfully let down I feel after page 309.
It’s clear I should have looked for inspiration elsewhere.
And Meryl!!! You should have known better.
3 comments:
while on girlie books, i am on one myself... eat, pray love.. just done with the eat part and now into pray. and i am liking it. the book is funny, honest and most importantly the author is self-deprecating. I likey :)
:)...will try it then
Depends on what frame of
mind you approach a movie or book with.
I consider myself a realist...hate those
Karan Johar, "churi", "kangna" "palatial houses"
"son's loyalty to adopted parents" kind of movies.
But on some days, frivolous stuff really cheer me up.
I haven't read the book, but have watched the movie...
and I think I enjoyed it. Perhaps because no other
movie really dealt with blogging, my "then" current
obsession. I am far from cooking or setting such
ambitious culinary goals, which is why, perhaps, I
really admire people who can cook well.
Maybe I'd feel the same way as you if I read the book..
but just watching the movie was not that bad :)
And maybe I wouldn't have watched it anyway if
it was not for the star cast.
Anyway, I understand your frustration and all
I can say is that "choose the next book well".
Post a Comment