The Menu: Everything is amazing

Movie Review: The Menu (2022) on HBO Max

To say it's suspenseful is to downplay it. To say it's a thriller is to come up short. To say it shocks is to give it short shrift. The Menu is many things, but as a film it is a mind-blowing mystery that never fails to surprise and keep you wondering what could possibly happen next. 

Cast, timing, and the element of surprise is what make this film work.

Ralph Fiennes is Chef. He is ego personified, chief among all those of the guests invited to marvel at his exclusive restaurant on an island far removed from the drudgery of civilization. Anya Taylor-Joy is Margot, seemingly the alter-ego, the least polished of the posh guests on the list. She is companion to Tyler (Nicholas Hoult), who is most eager of the guests to be impressed and most eager to impress Chef. John Leguizamo is a movie star most eager to make appearances. And so the list goes on of the rich and pompous for whom Chef has prepared a multi-course lavish meal for which he is famous. 

Timing is everything. As Chef prepares each course for serving, he chaps his hands and the cook/servers yell, "Chef!" and guests come to attention. As a viewer, you come to attention, too. And like an illusionist about to perform the next extreme feat of magic, you prepare to be surprised. First, by the elegant culinary delivery. Then by the...

...the excellent element of surprise. After a bit of discourse on the meal, or the food, or some bit of history, Chef slaps you to attention with a dramatic twist.

Some of it is shocking. And you wonder--what in the hell! How did he do that? Is this real? Some of it is genius. All of it just leads you into the next course, wondering but not ready for the next slap. And then it comes.

The Menu is an odd title. This isn't about the menu. It's about The Delivery, the Final Delivery. Don't dare bow out early. Stay to the end. You really must. You won't believe it.

And so, I rate The Menu an A+ for Amazing. The food looks amazing, the presentation is amazing, the casting is amazing--everything is wonderful. If it just weren't so shocking! No, that was amazing, too, in retrospect.

Chef: Another of the Great Food Movies

Movie Review: Chef (2014)
Version: Netflix

One of my favorite film writer-producers is Jon Favreau. As my wife says, "He has a real feel for people." He does. Favreau has a feel for what audiences like and for what make characters interesting. As a writer, Favreau also has a flare for the humorous and the emotional. All this came together in the making of Chef, a heavily character driven story about a successful gourmet chef in California who finds himself in a flame war on Twitter with a leading restaurant critic, which causes him to lose his job and his professional dignity in front of the whole world. 

Jon Favreau is also a terrific actor and he plays the male lead as Chef Casper in this movie that he also directs, playing opposite Sofia Vergara as his ex-wife, Inez, and Emjay Anthony as his son, Percy. There is also a particularly intense scene in the restaurant in which he plays opposite Oliver Platt as the critic Ramsey Michel and an unpleasant confrontation with the owner of the restaurant, Riva, played by a usually affable Dustin Hoffman. Favreau is his most amazing with his kitchen staff, including souse chef Martin played by John Laguizama, and in scenes with Laguizama and Anthony teaming together in a taco truck while traveling from Miami to California with many scenic stops in between, trying to save his career and his relationship with his son. You should see Favreau chop vegetables, butcher a pig, sauté in a pan, like the real thing! He's also great at plating food. As a creative director, he made Chef another of the great food movies!

There are high points and low points in this film. But the highs well overcome the lows, and the lows are the subject matter not the techniques. You will breeze through this film with the amazing cinematography and wonderful acting and what is a great script. I dare you to not like this film! It's a plain joy to watch with Favreau leading affable characters who make you like watching.