Eat Pray Love...and Review

When Eat Pray Love first hit book stores in 2006 it turned into a sensation.  I picked it up in 2008 while working in a school district, having found it on a "read and swap" bookshelf in the teacher's lounge.  I had heard great things about it, and having traveled to Italy (and just having a love for traveling in general) I decided it would probably be a great read!

Eh, it was okay.  There were parts I liked and parts I didn't like.  Personally, I found the Italy part of the book too long.  I loved the India section because I found it intriguing and exotic, although I know people who didn't much care for it because they couldn't relate.  The Bali part proved indifferent to me, but it is what it is.  Overall, I think the hardest part about the book, for me, was that I felt like I was supposed to feel sympathy for someone who could take the advance she received on a book she hadn't yet written to go spend a year "finding herself"...aka on vacation.  And I couldn't seem to get my sympathy meter working.  That, undoubtedly, was the hardest part for me with the book.


Therefore, when the movie came out, I determined it was not a theater-must-see, that I could wait until it hit Netflix to make a point of watching it.  I do love Julia Roberts and Javier Bardem so even if it was just for them I would watch it.  I even heard it was better than the book, which is a rarity in and of itself, so I knew I wanted to watch it eventually.

So today, while recovering from mild detox-dehydration (yay gallons of water and cheese!) I watched the movie version of a book I didn't care for so much, and what they say is true.  The movie is better, although it is still very flat.  I didn't mind that there wasn't much depth to the movie, but it is definitely worth noting.  I did find, though, that I connected with Liz much better in the movie than in the book.  I found her need to find who she was and escape the monotony that seemed to encompass her life a reverberating echo with the way I sometimes perceive my own life.  As a result, some people might find it hard to connect with the main ideas of the movie, but it was almost nice to know it wasn't just me that felt that way sometimes.  


Overall, the movie was okay.  It's a great "I'm sick and want to watch a movie to pass the time" kind of a movie.  And who knows, maybe I'll even carve out a little space in my own day for some meditation and late night pasta soon.  Ciao!