Chef

2014 food movie

Rating: 15/20

Plot: A chef who doesn't understand how social media works gets himself into some trouble following a bad review and has trouble finding another job in the kitchen. He gets some help from Iron Man and starts up a food truck business with his sous-chef and his son.

This is the second food-related movie I've seen in the last week, and apparently I really like food movies or scenes where characters work with food. Maybe I'm supposed to be a foodie, but I don't think so because I can't stand that word. But I've liked food documentaries (I Like Killing Flies and Jiro Dreams of Sushi) and foodie dramas and comedies (Tampopo, Ratatouille, Soylent Green). There might be a Food Movie Fest in our future.

This is Jon Favreau's baby, and it seems like he might be a foodie. It looks like he knows what he's doing in the kitchen anyway. I suspect that he wrote and directed this movie just for the chance to get close to Scarlett Johansson and Sofia Vergara. Those are a pair of attractive human beings. Favreau's an attractive human being himself, but Vergara and Johansson? I'm not sure there's a man alive who could catch the eye of both of those women. I guess that goes to show you what a good personality and mad cooking skills can get you in life. Which reminds me--I need to learn how to cook. And I need to get a better personality.

Favreau really is likable. He's written himself a character that is flawed but has the type of heart and personality that makes you want to hang out with the guy. It's the only way that John Leguizamo's decisions in this movie make any sense actually. I really liked Leguizamo, too, a guy who always just seems so natural on screen. Here, it's almost like he didn't even realize he was in a movie at all. It's like he just thought he was hanging out with some buddies, cooking things and traveling across the country. There's one scene where Leguizamo makes a sandwich, and I swear, it's nearly sexual. I like a lot of the cast actually. Johansson and Vergara could just stand in the background, and I'd enjoy their presence. Amy Sedaris and Robert Downey Jr. have roles that are closer to cameos. Bobby Cannavale is an actor I've always liked, and I thought Oliver Platt made a fine foodie blogger. Foodie. God, I hate that word.

Best of all might be Emjay Anthony, this kid they found to play Favreau's son. I'm often overly critical of child actors, but Anthony was good, almost as much of a natural as Leguizamo. The actors, including Anthony, had a great rapport. The father/son relationship is as important to the movie as the food plot. All plots and subplots are a little uninspired and standard, and it's really the only thing that holds this back at all. It doesn't make anything that happens less sentimentally gripping, and Chef satisfies emotionally from beginning to end.

Actually, there's something else that annoyed me about this movie. Along with some modern references to reality television (Hell's Kitchen, Honey Boo Boo), a lot of this feels like an extended advertisement for Twitter. I wanted to penalize this a point for that, but the soundtrack, a just-about-perfect collection of eclectic sounds, is so good. It's heavy on Latino sounds and has a liveliness that perfectly accompanies this chef's journey.

And Mr. Bonetangles:

I could have watched that puppet for another 30 minutes.

Anyway, this is a very likable movie, one that inspired me to put cornstarch on my balls.