A Guide to Food Flicks

[chefmike]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/craig-..._b_248828.html

From a great culinary writer, who I only recently stumbled across at HuffPo and who refers to himself as a Hedonism Evangelist, which works for me....I haven't seen all of these flicks, but I was pleased to see that all of my favorites from amongst the ones that I've seen were mentioned...

Big Night
Directed by Cambell Scott and Stanley Tucci, 1996. Bankruptcy threatens the New Jersey trattoria even though the food is top notch. No, make that because the food is top notch and their market wants standard Italian American fare. The two Italian immigrant brothers who run the place Primo (Stanley Tucci, who 13 years later would play Paul Child in Julie & Julia) and Secondo (Tony Shalhoub) hear that singer/trumpeteer Louis Prima plans to come there for dinner. They plan a great meal centered around a spectacular dish called a timballo and invite all their friends to save their bacon. Good insights into family businesses, the restaurant business, hopes, and dreams. And the food looks scrumptious. Mini Driver and Isabella Rossellini co-star.


Eat Drink Man Woman
Directed by Ang Lee, 1994. A retired chef who is losing his sense of taste lives with his three modern daughters in Taiwan. They gather every week for traditional Sunday dinner and we watch them prepare intricate dishes that express their true feelings as they struggle to relate to each other and their differing tastes. It was remade in English in 2001 by Maria Ripoll rather nicely as Tortilla Soup starring Hector Elizondo as a Mexican-American restaurateur in LA.


Who is Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?
Directed by Ted Kotcheff, 1978. A light-hearted silly mystery as we try to figure out why the great chefs of Europe are all being killed in a manner related to their most famous dishes. For example, the chef famous for pressed duck is found with his head smashed in a duck press. Robert Morley is perfect as the British food critic, and Jacqueline Bisset is luscious as the dessert chef famous for her bombe. George Segal must solve the mystery before the bombe goes off in his love interest's face. The story spotlights the competition between chefs and their hatred of critics. Score by Henry Mancini.

And I cracked up at this cult classic being included:

Soylent Green
Directed by Richard Fleischer, 1973. It is 2022, and New York City is in more chaos than usual. Forty million people are toiling there and eating only what they think is a soybean-based slop called Soylent Green. Thorn (Charlton Heston) is a detective trying to figure out who killed Soylent Green's manufacturer. Good twist ending.

[rockabilly]

Nice picks

[Jericho]

Soylent Green
Directed by Richard Fleischer, 1973. It is 2022, and New York City is in more chaos than usual. Forty million people are toiling there and eating only what they think is a soybean-based slop called Soylent Green. Thorn (Charlton Heston) is a detective trying to figure out who killed Soylent Green's manufacturer. Good twist ending.

I loved the 'licking the spoon with jam on' scene from that film.
It just said it all.