Menu, The

Very good film, good actors and well paced.

One of the more original black comedies to be made for quite a while. The film doesn’t drag- and that’s always a good sign. Good performances all round, and a wry comment on how unsatisfying modern society is today. And watching Fiennes as the Chef, I did not think of Gordon Ramsay in any way at all…

Quirky, unexpected and brilliant!

This film is directed by Mark Mylod, who has long experience as a TV director in Britain and the US - The Royle Family and Shameless among others. This may be his first cinema release. The script is written by Seth Reiss and Will Tracey. It is described as a dark comedy - I would suggest more dark than comedic. It has some of the surrealism of Inside No. 9 and much of the baroque style of Peter Greenaway. It lacks the humanity of either.The cast:a) Ralph Fiennes - as chef Slowick, once a passionate cook, now a disillusioned celebrity chef - who no longer loves his craft or his lifeb) Anna Taylor-Joy as Erin, who attends the meal as Morgan, girlfriend of Tyler: like Slowick she is in the service industry, as an escort or prostitutec) Nicholas Hoult as Tyler, whose life, like his relationship with Morgan is fake - he is a pseud who can talk a good meal but cannot cook - he is a catering groupie, obsessed enough with Slowick to be a stalkerd) Jane McAteer as Lillian, a powerful food critic, who attends the meal with the editor of the paper she works for - she has made Slowick and she can just as easily break himJohn Leguizamo, the generic Movie Star who attends with his agent Felicity, who is applying for other jobs - jobs with a future as Leguizamo's star is waninge) also attending, a well-healed middle age couple, the husband has sought Morgan's 'services' in the pastf) Three yuppie males, who are stealing from their company, siphoning off the money to accounts in the Cayman Islands - they are living-it largeWhat happens? The film begins with the diners boarding a boat which takes them across to an exclusive restaurant on an island. They have all been invited to the meal. No one lives on the island except Slowick and his staff. Once the boat has gone they are stranded until it returns - so far Agatha Christie. On board, they are served the first of about seven courses and like the rest this one is meticulously arranged, easy on the eye, a work of art too good to eat. Many of the scenes have a caption stating the course with a brief description of the food - the description is often elaborated by Slowick stating what the dish contains and how it was cooked or instructions on how to eat. Eating itself is a work of art. On the island, they are given a guided tour of the gardens and outhouses showing how the food is grown, harvested, stored, preserved, and slaughtered. They are shown the staff quarters - all staff, both male and female sleep in one sparse and clinical room, in two lines of beds. It is more like a prison or a monastery than a staff quarters.As the courses are served the viewer becomes aware of the characteristics and past actions of the guests which appall Slowick. Each course is increasingly ornate and extravagant - like Trimalchio's feast in the Satyricon. It also becomes ever clearer that Slowick is deranged and that everyone at the dinner will die, except for Margot, who unlike all the others was not invited. A member of staff dies and the owner of the island, dressed in an angel's or perhaps a swan's wings is deliberately drowned. The staff is regimented, assembling identical plates of food for the guests, stopping what they are doing, and shouting "Yes chef" every time Slowick claps his hands. The staff acts as a cult. Not just the staff - towards the end of the film Slowick states that they could have escaped if they tried or at least put up some resistance. On one level this is not true - in a slapstick sequence, the men are given permission to escape and fail, largely because there is no way off the island. Though the staff outnumber the guests, the odds are not impossible, they could put up a fight with some chance of winning. Another indication that the gathering is a cult is the fact that Tyler, when he was invited, was told that he would experience the best food ever cooked but at the end of the meal he would be killed. It is possible that he did not bring his girlfriend and hired Morgan in order to save the girlfriend. At the end of the film - the guests, Slowick, and his staff become the last course, S'more, a concoction of every glutinous, congealed sweet stuff that has ever been thrown together, which is highly inflammable. the guests are clothed with it, ignited, and die in the flames without offering resistance.As a set of ideas, this is an interesting film - but it fails to offer sufficient reason for the immolation. In Drowning by Numbers the women kill their husbands, but they have been betrayed - they have been hurt and are experiencing pain. Slowick no longer cooks food people enjoy eating - Morgan realizes this and asks for a Cheeseburger with fries, telling him she cannot stand the food he has offered. He cooks a marvelous-looking, simple burger for her - he enjoys cooking it and she (after getting off the island) enjoys eating it. Surely that is the solution to his problem - rather than the death of thirty or so people. In other words, his actions are completely discordant with any harm suffered. The other related problem is that while some of the guests are detestable, others have human frailties. Tyler is a pseud and a groupie - but does he deserve to be driven to suicide for these two admittedly sycophantic traits? The elderly wife - her fault is putting up with her husband consorting with prostitutes and the Movie Star's crime is he made a bad film, which Slowich did not enjoy on his day off. It is clear from the get-go that Morgan will survive because she is 'feisty' - surely if anyone told a psychopath their food was awful, they would be first for the chop. Finally, though the actors make the best of their parts, why do English actors have to put on fake American accents? It does not work when Americans put on English accents and it rarely works when we reverse the favour. Other than that no gripes over the acting John Leguizamo, Nicholas Hoult, and Jane McAteer played their roles to perfection - hence three stars.

Really good, funny, thrilling!

Just not my kind of film

For once a good script, beautifully played by everyone in it. Actors can only interpret what's given them and they all excellent in this. Rhalp Fiennes has never been better. He has that rare quality all excellent actors have, you care what happens to him.

Friend chose this, was super tired but stayed awake until the end. So, I guess there’s a level of intrigue and a lot of plot twists.