Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on September 2010

Jeez, the title of this me-first memoir by journalist Elizabeth Gilbert made me gag when it was on the bookshelves! A colossally self-absorbed woman (Julia Roberts) dumps her devoted husband (Billy Crudup) for reasons undefined in order to “find herself.” She takes up with a young actor (James Franco), but dumps him too and heads off for a few months of gluttony in Italy. Then she morphs into one of those type-A hippies at an Indian ashram, where she learns to spout trite aphorisms. She ends up in Bali where, with the guidance of a dentally challenged fortune-teller, she hooks up with fantasy lover Javier Bardem (where’s that pneumatic cattle hammer when you need it?). For all this soul-searching and self-finding, she seems little changed at the end. And she’s so unlikable, who cares? Roberts does fine, and uses her whole charm arsenal to make the Liz character tolerable. I couldn’t help but think, however, that only an actress on the level of, say, Rosanna Arquette or, yeah, Madonna could bring the requisite shallowness to the role. Banal, preachy and a big bore.