For those who haven't heard of her, Julia Child was America's answer to Fanny Cradock, and she's played here with hilarious gusto by Meryl Streep. Following separate timelines, the film details Child's experiences in late 1940s Paris which led to the 1961 publication of her seminal book Mastering the Art of French Cooking, and the year - four decades later - that contemporary New Yorker Julie Powell spends cooking all of its 524 recipes. A frustrated writer, Powell (played by an amusingly angsty Amy Adams) recorded her exploits in a blog that eventually became a bestseller in its own right, and is the joint source of inspiration for the script along with Child's own memoirs. Powell's story is a fun-filled mission that will appeal to a new generation of Nigella wannabes, while Child has a few lessons to impart to the modern woman trying to balance personal and professional ambitions. This is a warm and welcome refreshment from writer/director Nora Ephron following the undernourishing experience of Bewitched in 2005.

Julia Child and Julie Powell – both of whom wrote memoirs – find their lives intertwined. Though separated by time and space, both women are at loose ends... until they discover that with the right combination of passion, fearlessness and butter, anything is possible.