Eat Pray Love Puke
Posted on 19. Mar, 2010 by jessekg in Film
The trailer for the movie adaptation of Elizabeth Gilbert’s ridiculously popular, best-selling beach read Eat Pray Love is making the rounds and already there are more than enough reasons that this could be the worst date movie in history. In fact, it could be the worst movie for couples, period. I for one will likely end up seeing it with my wife and then a) probably like it, b) instantly regret it, then c) spend the rest of 2010 being self conscious that said wife will leave me to go eat pizza in Italy for a year and have a spiritual orgasm, or something like that. Here’s why.
The problem begins with the people who put this trailer together, convincing me that it’s probably a “safe” movie to see, but will ultimately end in a new quarter life crisis.
One, it opens with a great Ryan Adams’ song, “Oh my God whatever,” which you dont often hear in movie trailers, so right away it’s gaining my trust and appealing to my inner music snob. You know, if they have my taste in music, maybe they will have my taste in movies and this won’t turn into some sympathetic, mushy hour-and-a-half Hallmark moment? Wrong, that is exactly what this is going to be. And what’s worse, every female in the audience is going to feel that life as they know it is completely meaningless and futile unless they spend the rest of 2010 in Italy eating pizza.
Which brings me to another, completely random negative side effect of this movie. There is a pizza place in Naples, Italy, and it’s rumoured that it is the place that originally invented pizza. Not just like they make the best pizza in town, but they literally invented the entire idea of it. I went there once and it was down an alley in a shady part of Naples and had the decor of a truck stop, but at lunch the line up of mostly Italians was around the block. Their pizza is the best pizza in the world, by far, and when I heard that it was mentioned in Gilbert’s book I thought, oh, neato. What a coincidence (just kidding, I don’t think things are neato).
But now that it is going to be commemorated in this movie, which will no doubt be just as popular as the book, that block long line up of locals is going to change in two ways – it will be two blocks long, and instead of a bunch of locals it is going to look more like the line up for New Kids on the Block tickets (i.e. middle aged women desperately not trying to come to terms with the fact that they are no longer 18, sexy, or single). The place will become so overwhelmingly popular that it will turn into an international chain, the commercials will have loveable little cartoon mascots that look like the Mario Bros., and the quaint little menu that only features two types of pizza (margherita or marinara) will all of a sudden have something called the “meat stack attack” for the millions of Americans who will demand it.
But what every female needs to know about Eat Pray Love before they start gushing all over it and leaving the country en masse for year long, pizza eating spiritual journeys is that Gilbert didn’t just drop everything in her life, pick up and go. She was a successful author who had already sold the rights to her other book about a little bar called Coyote Ugly, and she had a book deal for this trip. In essence, she was making money just by traveling around, eating, praying and loving. Try this without a book deal secured and it’s more likely you will be less Eat Pray Love, more Eat (from the dumpster) Pray (for a hot meal) and Love (just for a warm place to sleep).
Another thing that is going to ensure that “How Stella got her groove back, part II” is the worst date movie ever is that whenever a guy embarks on this kind of idea (pretty much anything by Nick Hornby) he is boyish, self centred, immature, sometimes suffering from what is called Peter Pan complex, and just otherwise wrong about everything. When a woman does it not only is it liberating, but all the problems stem from one thing – the aforementioned man. It’s all our fault in the end, and I can already feel the death stares every guy in the theatre is going to be pretending he doesn’t feel from his significant other as they start to wonder if he is the root to every single unhappy moment in their life, and wouldn’t they just be happier by themselves eating pizza in Italy for a year?
So I guess this is the point where I propose that no one in any sort of relationship at all watch Eat Pray Love until it can be watched in succession with Andrew Gottlieb’s reactionary story, soon to be movie, Drink Play Fuck. Trust me, it’s for the best.
Simon
Mar 20th, 2010
I’m guessing Gilbert’s newest book, where she basically explains how despite her crazy liberation journey, ultimately she gets settled into married life, is going to be an equally disappointing movie sequel.
Jef
Mar 24th, 2010
“In essence, she was making money just by traveling around, eating, praying and loving.”
……..
Mandie
Jul 27th, 2010
While I do think this movie has problems — not the least of which is the enormous privileges she exercises to move through her life crises — I actually read the book and expected to eye roll through the whole thing. It was more conscious than I expected. Gilbert is actually fair to the men she writes about. I even have a friend who’s close to one of the men Gilbert was with and apparently he has no hard feelings towards her even after the book became a household name. She takes responsibility for her part in failed relationships and she also acknowledges how unlikely her story would be for most women, recognizing, at least in a limited sense, the privileges she has in terms of access to funding the trip and the cliched nature of what she does in the book.