Eat Pray Love movie review

When you’re watching a movie and find yourself realizing that you enjoy the ravioli’s personality better than the lead actor’s, you know you have a problem. 

Julia Roberts does all she can to glow and smile, and crunch up her forehead in desperation when called for, but she can’t save this movie from it self-indulgence.

The story of Elizabeth (Liz) Gilbert has been talked about in book clubs since 2004’s Eat Pray Love first hit the best-seller’s list.  In the book, Liz comes across as a humbled friend with a self-deprecating wit and real passion for travel.  In the movie, Liz is a fun but utterly spoiled brat enjoying a nice vacation.

The movie opens with a gorgeous shot of Roberts pedaling through the lush scenery of Bali.  Cut to New York a few years earlier and a more drab, but no less fabulous Roberts enjoying the middle-rich life of a published travel writer on her second novel, a beautiful husband, funny and successful friends, not to mention a trendy apartment.

So…what is her plight exactly?  She has everything but feels trapped.  This theme has been on the big screen lately with “chronically dissatisfied” Cristina from Vicky Cristina Barcelona (Scarlet Johansson), and desperately unhappy with the American dream April Wheeler from Revolutionary Road (Kate Winslet).  So why did Johansson and Winselt do so much better in the same topic?

Much of the movie’s faults begin in the first opening minutes.  We never truly understand what’s eating Gilbert, Liz.  She suggests that since she “was fifteen I was either in a relationship with a man or breaking up with one.  I haven’t had two weeks to deal with myself.”  So why does she fall into a steamy relationship with young actor (James Franco) about 15 minutes into the movie?  It’s a mid-life crisis calling itself a journey. 

Look, I don’t want to rain on a pretty girl’s parade, but if I’m watching a movie about a person running away from something so profound she needs to leave the country for a year I’d like to at least understand why she’s running.

However, I am glad that she ran to Italy first.  The rich Italian food and the splendor of the ancient city are shot with such passion it’s nearly pornographic.  In Italy, Liz finds friends, and wine, and quiet solitude of all things beautiful.  Roberts is never as warmly magnetic as she is while setting a crisp asparagus on her plate in this city of fairy tales.  We wish we could join her.  Then again, if we were there she’d probably ignore us.  Much happens in the lives of her friends in Italy but Liz is never shown being a part of it.  She is the center of her own universe.



The film falls apart in the first car ride in India.  While in the book Gilbert delicately but fondly explains her concept of grace and pray, Roberts never quite makes that leap.  She seems stiff and condescending the entire time in India.  Considering that “Pray” is 1/3 of the movie’s title, this really is quite a shame. 

The bright spot of India is Richard Jenkins who plays Richard from Texas, a man in his early 60s hiding away at this Indian spiritual temple after his drug habit ruined his family.  Richard challenges Liz’s sincerity and selfishness.  Unfortunately, Richard only provides comedic relief for so long before he becomes the obnoxious Dr. Phil-type with no mute button. 

The movie is never brave enough to delve into spirituality in India, or truly get into the culture like it does Italy.  Liz does try to befriend a young Indian girl about to go through an arranged marriage, but Liz never tries to get to know her or the culture, and soon she’s flying to Bali for what we know will become the “Love” portion of her trip.

Bali feels like a conversation you’re having with a friend that you need to wrap up in 3-4 seconds because they’re phone is ringing. 

She’s in Bali with her mentor she likes to call Yoda, attempting to find her balance before going home.  Yoda, like the Indian girl, like the Italians, like her ex-husband, like her NY lover, and her Bali medicine woman, are shown to be such caricatures we can’t quite seem them more than clowns.  Even Oscar-winner Javier Bardem can’t escape being 2-dimesioned.   

When dashing Javier Bardem as Felipe drives on screen with “Samba De Bencao” filtering through the screen, it’s blatantly Liz doesn’t stand a chance at singledom. 

It’s a whirlwind romance involving swimming in the clearest Bali ocean, and making love in the warm forest of Felipe’s expensive hut.  It’s just lucky happenstance that Liz has found the only Brazilian in Bali with a vasectomy and a heart of gold. 

The best line of the film (and what I hope is the thesis for women everywhere) Liz yells, “I don’t need to love a man to love myself!”  After over two hours of globe-trotting I was rooting for this kind of finish.  Perhaps Liz found herself and can now love someone as an equal. 

Her medicine woman gives her some advice that sometimes love makes us unbalanced which makes us balanced, and she’s quickly off into the sunset with her beautiful Brazilian man and his boat. 

In real life Elizabeth Gilbert eventually marries this man Felipe, but only after a sequel to Eat Pray Love called Committed: A Skeptic Makes Peace with Marriage. 

In the movie, though, this marriage/independence question is left hanging.  Has Liz been healed?  What was her problem in the first place?  Was she selfish?  Is it okay to be selfish?  Is she saying that relationships are necessary to a healthy life?

At the end of it all, Liz still seems too lost in her own world to be a friend.  Even raviolis are open to be shared.