Review of Eat Pray Love (2010) by Deb S — 08 Apr 2011

Writer Liz Gilbert (played by Julia Roberts) enters the female equivalent of a mid life crisis and feels trapped in a marriage to a man she no longer loves. She asks for a divorce, the union ends and then Liz falls into the arms of a good-looking, younger actor (James Franco) for comfort but still she is unhappy.

She yearns for something more fulfilling and decides to step out of her comfort zone. Risking everything to change her life, she embarks on a year long journey around the world in a quest for self-discovery to find her zest for life. In her travels, she discovers the true pleasure of nourishment by eating in Italy; the power of prayer in India, and, finally and unexpectedly, the inner peace and balance of true love in Bali.

My thoughts: I thought there were good isolated performances by Billy Cudrup, James Franco, Richard Jenkins and Javier Bardem but in this movie, the whole world seems to exist merely to feed the main character's narcissism and to help her come to a series of wholly self-absorbed revelations about herself. There is a thirty minute romance at the last run of the movie with Javier Bardem as Felipe. Liz is clearly a woman who is defined only by her relationships. Am I being too harsh on Liz? You tell me. This is a movie about a woman yearning for something...else. Will she find it? Who knows?

~Possible Spoiler~.

To my thinking there's no reason to believe that this man is any more her true love than her husband or previous boyfriend so when Liz finally tells Felipe that she "doesn't need to love him first before she can love herself." I thought to myself, "Yes, she is starting to get it!" But then what does she do? She takes off on a boat with him in the end. The romantic part of me is saying "yayy, at last she found 'true love" but the realist in me goes "Does she need a man in her life to finally be happy or will she become bored after the novelty of being in love wears off?".