Written by Vickie
August 14, 2010
Something interesting happened to me while I was watching the big-screen adaptation of Elizabeth Gilbert’s bestselling memoir: I found myself fully engaged and moved by all the supporting players in the film, but decidedly put off by the central character.
Julia Roberts stars as Gilbert, who leaves her husband (Billy Crudup) and embarks on what’s meant to be a year-long global journey of self-discovery but which, in Roberts hands, sort of turns into the travelogue of a self-absorbed woman who doesn’t really do much changing.
Like the book, the film is divided into chapters of sorts: Gilbert’s life in New York City, her food-centric respite in Italy, her soul-searching visit to an ashram in India, and her steamy (literally and figuratively) stay in Bali. In each location, she struggles to find herself, whether it’s through a rocky rebound relationship with a much-younger actor (James Franco) while still in America, or with the between-meditations guidance of a somewhat-acerbic ex-pat (Richard Jenkins) thousands of miles from home, or in the arms of a new beau (Javier Bardem) in an Indonesian hut.
Yet, for some reason, the Gilbert in the film comes off as obnoxious, self-involved and so resistant to the very changes she herself claims to want that it becomes increasingly difficult to sympathize with her as she goes. I’m not sure if that’s Roberts’ fault, or if director Ryan Murphy (Glee) failed to construct a proper arc for the character, but the result is a lead who’s much less interesting and compelling than all the people around her.
Jenkins’ broken Texan is a moving standout, and he has a one-take monologue that’s easily the best thing about the entire movie. He, like most of the other men in the film, is painted with delicate, nuanced strokes, while Gilbert kind of stomps around, emotionally. It was much, much easier to relate to Crudup and Franco’s jilted beaus, or Bardem’s hopeful suitor, or even Hadi Subiyanto’s toothless medicine man, Ketut, than it was to side with the woman at the core of the entire story. Weird.
Of all the destinations, India provides the film with the most heart and its best moments. Gilbert’s sojourn in Italy is lively and fun, but the focus on food gets old fairly quickly – the audience gets the point after the third elaborate meal. And her time in Bali, while beautiful and breathtaking, winds up being the weakest link in the travel chain. It’s there that the character is the most uneven and borderline whiny, veering back and forth and, once again, giving off “me me me me, it’s all about me” energy that isn’t self-questioning so much as it seems self-ish.
All that said, the film – like the book, and like life itself – is about the journey, and it succeeds on that level. If you can look past the flawed traveler on that journey to savour the colorful sights, sounds and strangers-who-become-friends she meets along the way, some lovely messages await you.
