Julie is a worn down public servant living in New York who is struggling with the prospect of aging.

Julie hates her job, her life and the fact that while her friends are all successful independent women, she couldn’t even get her book published.

However, when her husband suggests she writes a blog about food, Julia finally finds her purpose in life and sets herself a challenge. To cook all 524 recipes in Julia Child’s classic cookbook in one year, something that turns out to be as hard as it sounds.

The film simultaneously tells the story of Julia Child and her struggle against social prejudice and her trials and tribulations to publish the very book that Julie is cooking from today.

The most incredible part about this film is that it is based on a true story because if it wasn’t you would never buy into its utterly contrived story.

The corporate execs in the start of the film look as though they are in their late twenties and the director’s impatience to get past the set up and into the story is so rushed that it doesn’t actually explain where the idea even came from.

However the film did have one saving grace, Meryl Streep.

With a staggering 15 academy award nominations under her belt it would be impossible to argue that she is anything but one of the greatest actors of all time and this film is testament to that.

Only Streep could take on a character so irritating in such a pretentious film and manage to bring it back from the brink with her elegance and staunch femineity, which lights up the screen...even if she does remind us a little of Mrs Doubtfire.

It is unfortunate however that none of this inspiration rubbed off on co-star Amy Adams whose melodramatic “breakdowns” would make any audience want to strangle her.

Admittedly though, as a 20-year-old guy, I am completely out of target audience for this film however I think some women would have trouble buying into it as well.