Too long, too bland and never really pays off in the way one might hope with such a strong premise and cast.
Comment
08/06/09
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Julie & Julia (2009)
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Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted:192
Fresh:143
Rotten:49
Average Rating:6.7/10
Consensus: Boosted by Meryl Streep's charismatic performance as Julia Child, Julie and Julia is a light, but fairly entertaining culinary comedy.
Theatrical Release:Aug 7, 2009 Wide
Box Office: $94,125,426
Synopsis: Meryl Streep is Julia Child and Amy Adams is Julie Powell in writer-director Nora Ephron’s adaptation of two bestselling memoirs: Powell’s Julie & Julia and My Life in France, by Julia Child with... [More]
Starring: Meryl Streep, Amy Adams, Stanley Tucci, Chris Messina
Director: Nora Ephron
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Reviews for Julie & Julia
Julie & Julia proceeds with such ease and charm that its audacity is easy to miss.
08/06/09
Top CriticNora Ephron's Julie & Julia is one-half delightful and one-half disappointing; luckily, the delightful part stays with you while the rest fades away.
08/06/09
The ideal recipe has a special ingredient that can lift a dish from meh to memorable. Meryl Streep -- at her brilliant, beguiling best -- is the spice that does the trick for the yummy Julie & Julia.
08/06/09
Top CriticThe cuisine may be French but the spirit is as American as apple pie.
08/06/09
For all the talent invested in Julie & Julia, it's ultimately a bland cinematic dish that needed more comedic spice.
08/06/09
Streep's Julia reminded me more of Akroyd's Julia than Julia's Julia.
08/06/09
This is blissful moviemaking. Much of the pleasure we have in watching it comes from seeing Tucci and, obviously, Streep connect. But it’s also the effortlessness Ephron reveals in bringing it all together.
08/06/09
A lightweight but enjoyable gustatory romp.
08/06/09
Like Nora Ephron's captivating film, Streep's performance is haute cuisine disguised as comfort food, a complex preparation yielding effects both broadly entertaining and subtly moving.
08/06/09
Top CriticA smiley-face version of the The Hours that substitutes Julia Child for Virginia Woolf, food for suicide, jokes for despair, and startles us with its refreshing portrait of a good marriage.
08/06/09
Glossy and graceful, Julie & Julia is less about a full belly than it is about a full life, less about assembling dishes and more assembling one's self
08/06/09
Julie & Julia is two movies in one. That’s one more movie than it needs to be.
08/06/09
The joys of the Julia parts are cumulative, and addictive. The Julie parts keep forcing us to go cold turkey.
08/06/09
Top CriticGetting something half right would never have been good enough for [Julia] Child, and the movie goes all sorts of wrong with Julie.
08/06/09
Meryl Streep, as Child, is this film's butter; everything else is garnish.
08/06/09
an enjoyable experience -- just not as filling as it could have been.
08/06/09
Julie & Julia was directed by Nora Ephron with a light touch that will satisfy an eager audience of female foodies.
08/06/09
Makes deboning a duck a feminist act and cooking a great meal a creative triumph. The stakes may not be as high as the kill-or-be-killed suspense of a summer action movie, but the sauces are way tastier.
08/06/09
I suppose it’s telling that the only time in Julie & Julia that I heartily chuckled was during an archived clip of Dan Aykroyd impersonating Child on Saturday Night Live. Now there was entertainment with some life to it.
08/06/09
Latest News for Julie & Julia
August 06, 2009:
Critics Consensus: It's Quiet For G.I. Joe. Too Quiet.
This week at the movies, we got real American heroes (G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, starring Dennis Quaid and Sienna Miller); kitchen chronicles (Julie & Julia, starring Meryl... More...
August 06, 2009:
Box Office Guru Preview: Go, Joe!
Some real American heroes look to storm the box office this weekend as Paramount unleashes its latest toy franchise film G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra. Sony counters with the... More...
July 31, 2009:
Julie & Julia: Food Facts in Pictures
French chef Julia Child's fascinating transformation from neophyte to TV cook is the subject of next week's Julie & Julia, or rather part of the story; the other half is told... More...
July 29, 2009:
Film Food Ready for Its Close-Up in Julie & Julia 
Nora Ephron's "Julie & Julia" isn't just one of the more intriguing movies being targeted at the female demographic this summer -- it also represents just how far food in film... More...
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