This film was in the news as pretty woman Julia Roberts was in India shooting. We waited with bated breath and greedily gobbled every tidbit thrown at us about where she stayed, what she wore and what she ate.
Depressingly shallow, Eat Pray Love unfortunately cannot be classified and watched as a chick flick or a rom com because it is based on a memoir so there is all this heart-breaking angsty stuff. However, when you sit back and think, Elizabeth Gilbert's plight is not bad at all. I would not mind taking a year off to find myself in food (Italy), prayer (India) and love (Bali)
And to have the super hot Javier Bardem help me find myself is a delicious bonus I would never turn away from. But then this is Liz's story and not mine. So she takes a long time to figure her “word” and the cosmic rationale of life, the universe and everything. Liz is this successful writer who walks away from a loser husband to Italy to rediscover her appetite for life along with the most silken smooth spaghetti. She then dashes of to an ashram in India to learn to pray and then goes to Bali to party and find love.
Based on the 2006 memoir of the same name by Elizabeth Gilbert, “Eat Pray Love” (I always feel like writing Prey, but then that is just me) the film is extraordinarily pretty to look. There is Julia Roberts as Liz who looks stunning, Javier Bardem who is scruffy sexy and then there is Italy, India and Bali — places that don't require much work from cinematographer Robert Richardson to look pretty.
In our decidedly shallow, urban times, Eat Love Pray is a fair way to spend an evening. Rather long at 134 minutes, at the best you can OD on the eye candy and at worst it would be like being stuck with a whining travelling companion forever.
Eat Pray Love
Director : Ryan Murphy
Cast : Julia Roberts, Javier Bardem
Story : A woman travels to Italy, India and Bali to find herself
Bottomline : Escapist in a suitably shallow and pretty way
