Julie & Julia

[petronia]

Movie about Existence(tm) but not Horrible Dysfunction(tm), which is nice. XD The thesis is that the components of a purposeful, fulfilling life (marriage, friendship, vocation, avocation, home) and the effort women put into making theirs so are similar down to details, regardless of era or economic circumstance. Meryl Streep doesn't often play cuddly characters, so that was nice to see as well. Amy Adams' character was annoying, though: the small gods preserve me henceforth from movies in which bloggers blog on-screen then throw emo tantrums over their comment count, I don't have to pay 5$ to access that kind of entertainment. XD;

Mastering The Art of French Cooking is now #1 on the bestseller lists, supposedly. Here's the boeuf bourguignon recipe off Knopf as an FYI; I call BS on the servantless American cooks who STRAIN THE SAUCE AND WASH THE CASSEROLE HALFWAY THROUGH yeah right. Great that the cook unspokenly gets to finish the bottle of red though. XD Julia Child and her husband both lived to their nineties so there is your French Paradox in full effect.

Later the same evening I ended up - for reals - reading this Sylar/Mohinder fic in which - I am not making this up - The Joy of Cooking also played a role. Then again Julie & Julia deserves an extra half-star just for its A++ usage of Talking Heads' "Psycho Killer" which only goes to show. The moral of this story is not to follow links from ontd_startrek.

Comments

[z107m.livejournal.com]

It seems to be the general consensus that Julie just doesn't quite match up to Julia. Somehow a year of tantrums and domestic arguments isn't as dramatically engaging as spending 8 years writing a book and having your husband dragged into McCarthy's witch hunt (really, the high point of the movie for me). It was disappointing that you have to look to other sources to understand why Julia didn't like Julie's blog. And the more one reads about the real Julie, the more I have to believe that Amy Adams is one hell of an actress to make the character palatable. I blather.

You might be amused by this NYTimes article (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/26/dining/26fren.html?_r=1&ref=books) about boeuf bourguignon in 5 easy steps, in a book published in English for the first time. :b

[petronia.livejournal.com]

I've never made boeuf bourguignon, but I've made a number of similar things, and Julia's seems amazingly compartmentalized. I'd like to try it one day just to see if frying everything up separately instead of throwing them into the same pot really does make a difference to an oven stew. :P

[z107m.livejournal.com]

Frying everything separately helps each bit retain their individual, savory flavor. It's subtle and nice, but not practical and, hell, as you can see in the movie, you can still screw up despite the elaborate process. :b

[sub-divided.livejournal.com]

I bought my mother My Life in France a year ago, on the tail end of the books-about-food craze, but then she and my brother and my father went to see the movie without me. Bah.

[subaru-san.livejournal.com]

My mother has made this recipe before, though what she found was called "Boeuf Stroganoff". I'm not sure if she uses onions, but if so, they get melted. We only feel the mushrooms. I usually prefer this recipe when she doesn't put too much wine in it though, otherwise the taste is slightly too acidic for me.