Eat Pray Love- Movie Review

I saw the movie yesterday on TV again. Then remembered that I had written its review long back. Searched for the file and pasted it here.....

Life is more than just a choice between a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’. And, when, life asks you to choose ‘yes’, you must grab it before it leaves a ‘no’ for you as a last choice. This is what Ryan Murphy, the director, wants to convey.

As kids, we used to idolize Julia Roberts for the way she looked, and today we admired more of how she still looked.  As if, she was a perfect choice for being a ‘Liz’ who ate, prayed and loved.

The movie suggests- Eat Pray Love

Eating- portrayed by enjoying life, making merry, being a part of a family- loving, caring for those who may not be related to you in blood, and worrying with them for the ‘have nots’ and ‘but must have’ problems and participating in their lives and learning from them.

Pray- meant not just praying God, but yourself too, as the God, (as they say) dwells within you. And. Praying is not just praying, but understanding. After all, we don’t live for the things we pray for… or do we?

And finally love.

After losing somebody we loved/ trusted or just equating unhappiness with someone who loved us, we forget that there is always a next time, and tomorrow, another day.

Like Physics theory of gaining momentum by an object that is constantly at rest, we make our life too, constant and gain momentum and ‘for our good’, we decide not to hurt ourselves again, by falling in  love again, and more, not to lose ourselves and the balance we have attained.

Very truly, the healer in Bali told Roberts, that it is okay to imbalance your life for love.

Commercially speaking, the movie could not do well because of romanticizing the western fantasy of finding solace in the arms of tepid Eastern culture. Through the book's two and a half hour celluloid version, protagonist Julia Roberts does nothing to break the much hammered myth of India being the land of snake charmers and elephants. Her character Liz goes through more than just a mid life crisis -- multiple failed relationships and stagnation in every aspect of live scar her to the extent where she decides its time to address the 'I' within her, hence the trips to Italy (eat), India (pray) and Indonesia (love). Each segment in the three countries tells us a different story, yet the problem (Julia) remains the same. There are ample scenic moments that capture the lush landscapes of these three diverse terrains beautifully. Be it the Roman piazzas, or the crowded streets of Bali the camera captures every detail and magnifies it to appease your senses. Out of the three places, Italy offers the most fun setting, while the other two give the film a more serious tone. 

As the plot progresses, however, and Julia's character arrives at an ashram in India, there is some terrific acting both from Roberts and from Richard Jenkins, who plays Richard from Texas, and who gives the best performance of the movie when he finally reveals his painful story. 
One of the most beautiful inferences that Roberts drew, in the movie was that ‘ruins are beautiful’. What has ended now is over. Its remains remind you that it has passed over and in no case, it is likely to haunt or disturb or affect you in any manner.

One message conveyed to the society by the movie says- ‘a divorcee’ is not an insignia of being in a ‘wretched forever status’. Rather it is somebody who gathered courage to choose to say ‘yes’ to life and move on rather than staying with a ‘no’ all through his/ her life with a fake ‘ok’ till death.

Hence, certainly the movie is a one time see, and Julia being the reason of ‘once more’.