PAUL… PAUL… P-PAUL!!!

Julie and Julia

I was skeptical at first on this one. I still don’t know what to think about it though. I still was a little bit bored during the film because it is phenomenally estrogen driven. I also was bored because it didn’t move as quickly as I would have like to see it move. I wasn’t bored because there was a pretty good conflict. It was also kind of funny in some spots.

SYNOPSIS! There’s this girl that she and her hubbers move to queens. In the movie they go through what happens with Julia Child. She’s moving to Paris and adjusting to the french lifestyle. Queens is having a hard time feeling comfortable in the apartment that they are living in because she’s a big foodie and the kitchen sucks. Julia is having a hard time because she’s a proactive woman and needs something to do.

Queens works for an insurance company or something like that which is handling all of these post 9/11 family tragedies. It’s a depressing job. She hates it and it shows. She tries to find some way to cope with the depressio feelings that she gets from her job and the depressio feelings that she has from having to live in sucky Queens. She make a decision to start a blog where she takes Julia Child’s cook book, Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and makes all of the recipes in one year. A pretty daunting task when you see that there are 500 some odd recipes. But she goes for it and it all looks de-freaking-licious. Seriously, it was giving my stomach the rumblies something fierce.

During this time that Queens is doing all of her stuff it cuts back and forth between her and Julia. Julia Goes to cooking school and is approached by these French cooking goddesses that want her to translate their cook book to English. She struggles with the problems and drama that come with working on a cook book and the pain that comes with being rejected by publishers left and right.

While queens is doing her blog she runs into some of the big conflict which is part of what I mentioned that I liked. She and her husband start having a little bit of a rough patch because she forgets about him and focuses too much on her blog. It alludes to the fact that they haven’t loved each other up in quite a while and he starts getting all frustrated.

Which brings me to something that my wife has quoted a number of times. My wife loves Dr. Laura more than she loves me(that’s not the quote). One of things that the good Dr. has said goes a little something like this, not verbatim, but no man will leave a woman who will provide him with sex and sandwiches. I fully believe this to be true.

Now I’m not just saying this to have my wife be all “I’m proud of you for quoting the good Dr.” but It has some meat to it, and not just in the sandwich. (ba dum bum) If a man has a good woman the will give him BOTH of those things he’s going to be happier than a bird with a french fry. I put both in caps because it goes in pairs. If you’re just getting sandwiches you’ll get frustrated for obvious reasons that I won’t mention because my in-laws will more than likely read this. If you just get the hibbidy dibbidy, then you’ll starve because you’ll forget to feed yourself.

Moving on! She finishes the year of her blog and all is well and they make a movie. I forgot to mention that this is a true story. Julia finishes her book and gets a cooking show.There really is more to the ending than what I told you but that’s because I didn’t want to spoil any of it for you. It was a lot better than I thought it was going to be. Go watch it. You won’t die. I promise.

Tune in next blog for Brittany’s review of Junior. It’s a gooder in case you haven’t seen it. Paz afuera!

Stoker Christmas Newsletter

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We can hold hands under the table.

So we decided to do a combined review for the three Charlie Brown movies on our list. These movies raise not a few controversial questions sent in by fake readers that we are going to now fake answer for all of you:

Which of the Peanuts gang do you feel you relate to best and why?

Brittany: I wish I could say Lucy. That girl’s got sass. In reality I am probably more like Schroeder. I don’t talk to people. I want to be left alone pretty much all the time. But I don’t play the piano as well.

Stephen: I would like to say the great Snoopy; however, I’m not that cool. I’d say Linus. He’s got the kind-hearted-I-know-things kind of attitude that I have.

The character of Charlie Brown is based on the life of the creator of Charlie Brown, Charles M. Schulz. Isn’t that interesting?

Brittany: Yes.

Stephen: Yup.

A Charlie Brown Christmas contains some of the best dance moves to ever hit the big screen. Or small screen. Really, any screen. Whose dance is your favorite?

Brittany: My favorite dancer doesn’t have a name but it’s the kid in the yellow shirt and the buzz cut who does a fabulous rendition of an Irish jig. I wish I could do it. All the boys would come to my yard.

Stephen: I say Linus, not because I think that I’d be him but because it makes me giggle.

If you were to date any one of the Peanuts gang, who would it be?

Brittany: I would absolutely go for the underdog. I would date Charlie. He’s the depressed brooding type that speaks to my heart. I like to save people from their miserable lives and slowly make them even more miserable.

Stephen: I’d go for Marci. She’s got the potential to one day achieve the hot secretary look. I also like girls with glasses. I don’t know why but it does it for me.

If you were Charlie Brown, would you give in and date Peppermint Patti or continue to pine after the nameless and ambivalent redheaded girl?

Brittany: Charlie just needs to let go of the girl with the red hair. I mean what’s this business about her giving him the cold shoulder in the Valentines Day movie? It’s just not right the way she treats him. Peppermint Patti will love him forever. Although annoyingly. And Patti has red hair too. Charlie shouldn’t be so vain.

Stephen: I would give in and date Patti. She is the controlling girl that he needs. She also has faith in him when no one else does. She likes him for the guy he is and truly nobody else does.

You are watching Lucy pull the football out from in front of Charlie Brown. Do you sit and laugh at him or punch Lucy in her crap lousy face?

Brittany: It’s a tough question because you’re pitting my hero (Lucy) against my fictional, brooding, animated love crush. In the end, however, I am always going to err on the side of meanness. Laugh it up. That stuff’s funny.

Stephen: Having been in poor Chuck’s shoes, I feel that punching Lucy in the face would only yield temporary satisfaction and not the psychological damage she deserves. If it were me I’d wait until I grow-up and become the virile man I’m destined to be (still waiting btw) and then ask her out and stand her up without notice. Just leave her waiting at her house and then drive by and honk with a more attractive girl by my side. Brittany, we have to drive by a couple of houses tonight.

Brittany: I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.

Why do you suppose that the adults in the Charlie Brown movies don’t have actual voices or faces?

Brittany: It’s probably because Charlie Brown movies are no place for adults. I once heard a theory that when Charles Schulz created these cartoons, the adults were dropping the F bomb and talked about sex pretty much all the time so they decided that in order to cater the movies to a younger audience, they just wouldn’t have any adults in it at all, or would make the adults voices a series of “wah wah wah’s”. But that’s speculation.

Stephen: You just made that up.

Brittany: You’re right.

In It’s the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown, Chuck makes a ghost costume but puts too many holes in it. Your buddy makes a ridiculous Halloween costume. Do you make fun of him for it or keep your mouth shut?

Brittany: Make fun of him for it. Definitely the way to go.

Stephen: You make fun of him for it unless he’s me. If you make fun of me I have the wit and speed to come up with some pretty awesome come-backs. “Where did you get those clothes? At the… toilet store?”

Brittany: It was the jerk store, actually. And they’d like you to come back because you were their #1 seller. Zing!

In A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving, Charlie Brown has people coming over for Thanksgiving dinner but doesn’t know how to cook other than toast (but can’t butter it himself) and popcorn. Describe the worst Thanksgiving dinner you ever had.

Brittany: One time my whole family went to California for Thanksgiving for a soccer tournament my little sister was in. I decided that I was not going to give into Courtney-worship and I stayed home. I lied and told my parents I was spending Thanksgiving with a friend. (I did debate calling one of my friends and inviting myself over last minute, but I didn’t want to stoop to Patti’s level when she invites herself to Chuck’s in the movie.) I wandered the streets of my hometown like a homeless person, peering in all my neighbors’ windows. It was sad.

Stephen: In Mexico there is no Thanksgiving. I missed it. Twice.

A Charlie Brown Christmas is all about Charlie Brown & Co. discovering the true meaning of Christmas. What does Christmas mean to you?

Brittany: Homemade donuts. I’ve never had homemade donuts on Christmas but it seems like that should be my new Christmas tradition.

Stephen: Amen to what Brittany just said. That sounds like my kind of Christmas.