345. The Menu; movie review

 

THE MENU

Cert 15

107 mins

BBFC advice: Contains strong violence, threat, suicide, language, sex references

Wow. The Menu was a surprisingly different and delicious attack on the senses and one of my favourite movies of 2022.

Mark Mylod's film is an intoxicating concoction of gastronomic sparkle, dazzling script, sublime acting and shocking cruelty.

It stars Ralph Fiennes as the celebrated chef of an exclusive restaurant on an island where he and his team live.

He insists his guests, who pay $1,250 each for their pleasure, should not eat their food but be mindful and taste it.

The diners are an eclectic assortment - beginning with an obsessive fan of the chef (Nicholas Hoult) and his squeeze for the evening, played by Anya Taylor-Joy.

While he delights in every morsel, commentating on the food's unique qualities, she believes he is being conned by the emperor's new clothes.

Indeed, the pretentiousness of high-quality cuisine and its associated writers and fans is a consistent undercurrent of The Menu.

Fiennes is wonderful as the chef who claps loudly to introduce each course and then tells progressively darker tales to go with them.

Taylor-Joy excels as his nemesis - a young woman who doesn't buy into the homage to his culinary work and will not be intimidated by his aggression.

Hong Chau is another stand-out as his maitre d’ - a wonderful combination of fawning and angrily defensive of her boss.

The menu's pitch is brilliant. It is a spiky comedy mixed with brutality and beauty on the plate and off it. 

It warmly deserves its plaudits.

Reasons to watch: Mouth-watering thriller

Reasons to avoid: Its violent scenes

Laughs: A couple of chuckles

Jumps: One

Vomit: None

Nudity: None

Overall rating: 9/10

Did you know? Dominique Crenn, the only woman in America with a three-Michelin-star restaurant, worked to make the menu to make the gastronomic delights realistic.

The final word. Mark Mylod: "That load of high-end cuisine, I knew very little about it. About 10 years ago, I made a deal with myself, instead of running away from subjects in a script that would put me off because I didn’t know anything about it, to go the other way and actually jump in. With “The Menu,” I jumped into that world and went straight into deep research." Cinema Daily US

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