...and now we speak of Julia

I rented my first red box dvd ever last night. Late, I know. What can I say, I love my traditions, even one as ephemeral as patronizing Blockbuster on a movie night. Anyway, it was Julie and Julia. Here’s what I thought

The first review I read was in Time a few months ago. Its general take was Merryl Streep, playing Julia Child, knocked the role out of the park, but Amy Adams, playing Julie Powell, didn’t do a great job and was a bit annoying. I heard this from a few people too. I take issue with that slant. I enjoyed Adams as Julie, a cute-as-a-button 30 year old migrant from Brooklyn to low-rent Queens who sits in a cubicle all day, answering calls for a company dealing with 9/11 fallout. She’s never finished anything she’s started. Her friend even features her in an article profiling 30-year-old NYC urbanites with disappointing innovative-urban-professional output. But she does love cooking, and her hero is Julia Child, so she decides to cook all 524 recipes from Child's French cookbook in 365 days and blog each day about it. Adams played well – not amazingly, but well - the shy, insecure, and ambitious Julie without distracting from the story.

The film alternates between scenes of Child in late '40s Paris, learning how to master French cuisine, then writing her famous cook-book for Americans, to our other present day Julie, slaving away in her cramped Queens kitchen, writing her blog, and gradually ascending to popularity in the blogosophere (and in reality).

Merryl Streep's performance was grating. The movie felt like two and half hours. It was only two, and I think it was due to her. Her realistic portrayal of Child, especially those high pitched throaty “ooooooooooos”, played out more like a caricature. I’m sure her performance wasn't over-the-top in the method acting sense, since Child was a bit of a loon, but it came off over-the-top, almost unreal, on screen. Streep's focus was superficial - she attempted to be the icon of Child. But icons are windows to the spiritual, and I didn't see any soul. Adams however played the role of Julie in a way that drew me into the story more than to her character. She was composed and contained and most importantly, served the story.

I guess Streep was method acting? Let’s talk about that for a minute. Something tells me method acting is a disordered approach to the art. It seems when performing that way, an actor is trying to portray his character as realistically as possible so he becomes completely believable to the viewer. The actor tries to adopt all mannerisms, voice, dress, twitches, appearance, and even soul of the character they’re playing. Paradoxically, I find such performances distracting. I will focus on how intense and accurate that one actor is which throws the others off balance. But a movie must be considered as an organic whole, involving many actors with many lines in many scenes. If one actor is out of balance they will affect the others no doubt. Moreover, a person is an organic whole, actors included. Completely reinventing yourself for each new movie seems like a recipe for schizophrenia. I recall Jack Nicholson deriding the method recently, for what it’s worth. Method acting also comes off as egotistical and inward focused, at the expense of the overall arc of the story. I guess its sort of eye-candy for audiences to watch, but ultimately its story that compels and inspires, not accuracy.

Most of the actors I enjoy don’t change markedly from movie to movie: George Clooney, Jack Nicholson, John Malkovich, Matt Damon, to name a few. Evidence that self-annihilation is not required for acting.

Other notes on the movie: lots of disgusting mouth noises, especially in the beginning. The subplot of Julie and Julia’s supportive husbands was refreshing and un-Hollywood. Both J’s exclaimed “bon appetite” too many times. I don’t think if was even cute the first time really. It’s a true story.

Now I want to make beouf bourginon. I told my mom this, and she said it was all the rage in the 60s in Long Island due to Child’s book. So the movie didn’t sell me on method acting, but it did make me hungry and willing to cook something French. There’s merit in that alone.