i disagree with the last comment. i think the book translated into the movie very well. i first saw this movie years ago and when i watched it recently with a friend, it was just as good as when i first saw it. it is about family, secrets, love, heartache, and passion. definitely not pointless.

This is an abominable adaptation of a breathtaking book. For a novel written through the language of love, and sex, and sensuality, and most of all through food, the movie is insultingly prosaic, as bland as dried-out white rice, and as devoid of any emotionality as… well, as Stephen Harper. I don’t know if it’s possible to translate magic realism onto film, but if there’s a way, this certainly isn’t it.

What a depressing, pointless tale.

Spoiler

Okay, I specified that one person couldn’t die at the end when I asked for a recommendation. As an elementary math teacher I should have known that my directions should have been more clear. Somehow the ending didn’t bother me at all, though. So I’m still saying that it was worth it.