Fridae

Meryl Streep is always, always worth watching. But even a luminous presence such as hers can’t quite keep Julie & Julia from being a partial snooze. Julie & Julia may be fun for a middle-aged viewer who’s into cooking, but a bit of a bore for everyone else.

Written and directed by Nora Ephron, Julie & Julia is a 2-in-1 biopic. It splits its running time neatly between Julia Child (Meryl Streep), a famous TV chef in the 1960s who introduced French cuisine to American public, and Julie Powell (Amy Adams), a real-life New Yorker who made a name for herself in 2002 when she blogged about cooking every recipe in Julia Child’s cookbook.

Every time Julia/Meryl shows up, the screen (as well as the audience’s faces) lights up. Meryl’s performance as a quirky cook with a grand passion for life is an absolute delight. On the hand, Julie/Amy is a modern woman so whiny, insecure and self-absorbed that you want to spend as little time with her as possible. The Julia segments soar, the Julie segments sag.

Writer-director Nora Ephron, whose films (You’ve Got Mail, Sleepless In Seattle) have always been on the draggy side, struggles to make Julie a more interesting character, especially when juxtaposed with the larger-than-life Julia.

Frankly, we wouldn’t recommend this movie. It’s like a 6-course dinner where 3 dishes are fabulous and the other 3 extremely average. But if you happen to be a big Meryl Streep fan, we suggest you get the DVD so you can fast-forward through all the Amy Adam parts.