There are so many things fundamentally wrong with this movie as well as with many details. Most have already been mentioned before me so I'll just rage a bit. 1, uses double standards, to say the least: if you are white and rich - "go out in the world to discover yourself" / if you are brown and poor: go for the arranged marriage no matter how much you'd love to study and find love. 2, even though the movie tries to be a feminist statement what we see is that a woman is nothing without a man and finding yourself EQUALS to finding a man 3, the shallow, stupid, irresponsible protagonist seems to be shown as a HEROINE (!) - an example to follow 4, "You'll lose all your money in 6-10 months" - eating gourmet food in Rome, not working for a couple months and traveling to 2 new continents? Well, well, well... 5, Rome, Italy is NOT a 3rd world country with no running/hot water. Though I lived in Italy I never heard anyone speaking the kind of English you hear in the movie (great English with extremely heavy accent). 6, There already are so many shallow and dumb people: why do you try to cater for them a shallow and dumb story (okay, other than because you earn well with it)? 7, Leaving an unhappy marriage, traveling to discover the world and living in new environments is a very brave thing. However: - not consulting with your husband and not having any communication about a divorce; - discovering the world means to you that you meet Americans who are just like you in India; - going to random places where you seemingly spend a lot and all you get to know is things you could understand from an "Italian / Indian / Balinese Stereotypes" paperback - this makes you shallow and below average. 8, Julia is completely indecisive. The one decision she makes throughout the movie is to keep up her schedule and balanced life. The Balinese medicine man convinces her with one sentence that she decided the wrong way. So she changes her mind immediately: puppet, Puppet, PUPPET! 9, Since Pocahontas we know that not all Hollywood movies need to have a 100% pinky-shiny-happy ending. Maybe Julia doesn't know it.
There are good things in the movie though: - you get hungry for a good pizza & fresh pasta - landscape shots, travel suggestions (Italy, India, Bali) - you'll probably feel superior to 95% the characters shown in the movie while utterly superior to the people that like this movie
This is one of the very few movies that made me angry lately.
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