What is the best FOOD movie?

Eating Raoul.

The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover

I definitely meant to include the Greenaway... but I thought it too disturbing to ever watch a second time.

Tampopo's my gut pick but man, this is tough.

Disturbing? Greenaway is too silly to be disturbing.

Frequently, but 23 years ago I thought that one worked.

The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover

― EZ Snappin, Monday, July 22, 2013 5:39 PM (13 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

I definitely meant to include the Greenaway... but I thought it too disturbing to ever watch a second time.

― playwright Greg Marlowe, secretly in love with Mary (Dr Morbius),

I've never seen it, but watching it triggered my cousin's anorexia so I've always been poorly disposed towards it.

Ratatouille, duh!

seen all the others, cryp?

think I've seen these all except La Grande Bouffe and Tampopo. Of them, I'd go with Ratatouille.

Night of the Living Dead (initiated the onscreen consumption of real animal entrails)
Texas Chainsaw Massacre (the whole process of eating, from the slaughterhouse to the griddle, plus food as a communal family occasion - see also Franju's The Blood of the Beasts)
The Corpse Grinders (human cat food)
The Stuff (highly addictive ectoplasmic gloop)
Theatre of Blood (celebrity chef Robert Morley choking on a pie made out of his pet dog)

My Dinner With Andre

Saw La Grande Bouffe not that long ago, reminded me a bit of Pasolini's Salo - fecal cinema - the literal end of the process

Should disqualify myself because I've only seen 3 of the voting options, but I'll vote Tampopo. I have seen the Greenaway and Eating Raoul, though.

Artie Bucco write-in.

Goodfellas

Seen 50% of the list.

Want to see Babette's Feast and Life is Sweet. Could be convinced to watch Like Water for Chocolate and Tampopo if I knew more about them (I vaguely remember the former being a well-regarded crossover hit, but never saw it at the time). I had never heard of La Grande Bouffe until just now.

I maintain that Ratatouille is the best comedy of the last decade by quite a distance.

The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover

otm. everything about this movie just blew me away.

Greenaway's unavailability on the various US streaming sites is a big frustration for me. (sorry to digress)

Really spotty DVD distribution too. Total bummer.

i like the strange feelings which come when you take a long walk listening to the soundtrack.

Ratatouille solely for the moment when nasty food critic has a flashback to childhood.

Big Night.

My Dinner with Andre is ALL TIME but it's not a food movie, Ward.

Pink Flamingos?

big night. that last shot, c'mon

how is sweet movie not in this list?

or 4...

DUMPLINGS! (bleck)

^ love that

Really spotty DVD distribution too. Total bummer.

A friend of mine has a foreign DVD of The Baby of Macon, keep meaning to sit down with it.

It's a bit of a slog, but pretty. And rapey.

ratatouille over tampopo and big night

A friend of mine has a foreign DVD of The Baby of Macon, keep meaning to sit down with it.

― Simon H., Monday, July 22, 2013 8:48 PM (6 minutes ago)

ugh. do not do this.

Ratatouille v Tampopo v Babette's Feast.

cloudy with a chance of meatballs u dragoons

ha but in all seriousness i've seen 0 of these so for all i know they're great

Ratatouille is a race-hate masterpiece dude.

voting for Tampopo which is far and away the yummiest looking of these iirc

Explain.

hot dog the movie

Hamburger: The Motion Picture

xxp

about Tampopo or about the movie about the character who hates himself because he's assimilated all the ethnic slurs aimed at his tribe, who incidentally all strive to live down to their stereotype?

o good lord

voting for Tampopo which is far and away the yummiest looking of these iirc

― what makes a man start polls? (Noodle Vague)

except grody egg sex

but yeah, tampopo

Have only seen Babette's Feast, voted for that. I know he has never made a 'food-movie', but Hou Hsiao-hsien might be my favorite director of dinner-scenes. Also, I would have voted for Hannibal if you'd included tv-shows.

"The God of cookery" is worth a mention. Stephen Chow's Kung fu chef comedy.

Good Burger

Soylent Green

Eat Drink Man Woman was better than expected.

My rankings:

Ratatouille
Big Night
EDMW
Tampopo

Well, that's Ang Lee's best film of the ones I've seen, still.

Good Burger
― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli)

I knew this thread would probably be a mistake, but I live in hope.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hEQDllvuy1I

i think i've told this story before but i managed to convince a movie watching party in college (including ppl i didn't know very well) to rent "cook, thief" and "wild things" as a double bill. i don't remember which one we watched first. everyone had a wonderful time and i wasn't allowed to pick a movie ever again.

all the seasons of iron chef before the current one with the new rules, ugh

I think I'm the only person in the world who liked Nightwatching.

the answer is 'daisies.'

Haha I came here to say that

Voted Tampopo before reading TC,TT,TW,AHL and Daisies as options. Would probably ultimately go with Greenaway>Tampopo>Daisies

voted with my tribe, so EDMW

The food design and videography on the tv series Hannibal is some world-class stuff.

Voted Tampopo.

"Cailles en Sarcophage!"

Otm xp

Jose Andres's involvement on Hannibal very amazing

No Untold Story?

no no no no no no no

There's no limit

nice voting, dudes.

lol

poll is invalid it left out DUMPLINGS!

feeling nordic and austere - voted Babette's Feast.

delicatessen. love that movie

Babette's Feast for me.
Julie and Julia was fun enough to be on the list I thought.

Eat Drink Man Woman makes me salivate just thinking about all the delicious food in that movie

I always think of Big Night every time I make risotto. Shalhoub was so good.

I'm torn. I'll have to go away and eat and think about it some more. I'm too hungry to vote right now.

There is a danish delicatessen-ripoff called 'the green butchers'. it's with mads mikkelsen in the lead role. As such, it might be fun for fans of Hannibal.

my review of the pro-proletarian Babette's Feast

http://www.slantmagazine.com/dvd/review/babettes-feast

Tampopo by a mile, c'mon folx, aside from creating its own genre (the noodle western) the entire film is about a love affair with food

Hook involves a foodfight with psychadelic colored pastries.

Tampopo, by a huge bowl of steaming ramen.

(I haven’t seen half of these films actually, but Tampopo is SO good.)

By the way, left out SupersizeMe? ;)

Good Burger
― Jersey Al (Albert R. Broccoli)
― Boven is het stil (Eric H.), Tuesday, July 23, 2013 10:42 AM (4 days ago) Bookmark

Would have to then define McDonalds as "food."

(xpost)

We'd also have to describe it as a "movie."

Eastern Promises (although a naked Viggo Mortensen fighting in the baths might have oveshadowed the food somewhat).

why would someone watch a movie about food when you can just eat it instead?

bcz i can't afford cailles en sarcophage

http://www.slate.com/articles/life/food/2013/07/cailles_en_sarcophage_babette_s_feast_s_richest_most_expensive_dish_made.html

We live in a food culture dominated by the notion that cooking is a performance art, something that you wow people with from behind the island of your open-concept kitchen as if you were the host of your own Food Network show. The covers of glossy cooking magazines exhort you to “impress your friends” with this or that new technique, while “celebrity chefs” by their very existence make the argument that a cook’s personality is more important than her food. This is the contemporary self-centeredness that makes Julie’s half of Julie & Julia so unbearable—she may master French cooking, but in the end, the only guest she’s interested in feeding is her ego.

Contrast that with Babette. My favorite scene in the film comes after the last, glistening course has been served, when she finally sits for a moment in the kitchen, her skin dewy from work, quietly sipping a glass of wine. The satisfaction on her face is the kind that can only come from the knowledge that you have created something that sustains both the bodies and the spirits of the people in your care.

this is prob a good thread to own up to how much i hate the cook the thief etc.

I never really considered Cook/Thief a food movie. I hadn't had my culinary consciousness raised yet when I saw it in '94 or so.

Eric, are you actually going to watch Babette?

none of em. this wins: http://www.secondrundvd.com/release_szindbad.php

xp Don't like quail, but I may watch a movie that features Lutherans being satisfied.

An academic question I have an interest in knowing the answer to: Can the meal in Babette's Feast be accurately described as nouvelle cuisine? Not in the modern usage perhaps, but the Wiki entry for n.c. says that the meaning of the term has changed across the centuries. Also this Criterion supp seems to declare it to be so:

http://www.criterion.com/current/posts/2844-babette-s-feast-and-the-art-of-cuisine

Automatic thread bump. This poll is closing tomorrow.

Automatic thread bump. This poll's results are now in.

"No Untold Story?"
Anthony Wong being in two unrelated movies about murderous bun makers needs some examination.

I had forgotten most of the nutty side stories in Tampopo, particularly the dying mom who makes one last meal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_God_of_Cookery

The 2 best scenes from Tanpopo imho are:

1) The junior colleague who orders like a savage (escargot vol-au-vent, quenelle boudin + 81 gran cru burgundy) when all his seniors order the same boring sole, consomme & heineken.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RRVLqUpHDJE

2) When Goro takes Tanpopo to meet his mentors, who turn out to be essentially a homeless encampment of vagabonds who forage for exotic vintages of half finished wine bottles from restaurant garbage and use them to masterfully blend them to perfection. It's just such an incredible scene, amazing dialogue and it's capped off with one of the mentors making a perfect omurice (showing that they are not above simplistic fare but executed with precision) for Tanpopo's son.

well those are great, no argument

I like Koji Yakusho and his gf passing the yolk back and forth too

He's been in some absolute stinkers for Western crossovers (Memoirs of a Geisha, Babel)... and even in Tanpopo he's kind of wasted, but via that role it was my introduction to Koji Yakusho which later led me to realize what an immense talent he is: Eureka, The Eel, Warm Water Under A Red Bridge... even Shall We Dance? he is fantastic.

tampopo is great in its portmanteau peripherals no question. big fan of the yolk, last supper and think often of the rice omelette.