MOVIES w/ food themes

[ChefGirl412]

Just watched Babette's Feast last night - loved it. Tried looking for a thread with this topic, but it had been removed. Anyway, just curious if anyone else has movie suggestions with good "food scenes." Thanks.

[ccllvvmm]

The is a lot of movies I like. Some are:
-Eat Drink man woman
- Like water for Chocolate
- Women on Top

[Passadumkeg]

Historically, possibly the first famous food scene in cinema: the pathos of Charlie Chaplin eating his shoe in The Gold Rush and the ensuing scene when another prospecter wnats to eat Charlie.
Also, an Argentine film, I think called The I about a poor Bolivian illegal immigrant working in a cafe.
And the cafe scene in the Motorcycle Diaries.

[MSK]

Saw an AMAZING movie last night that I don't believe I've seen mentioned on Chowhound that called to me to resurrect this thread!

GLOOMY SUNDAY is a sensual, German film from 1999 set in a restaurant in Budapest, Hungary during WWII.

The only surprise (and there were many) that I will give away is that a man's life was saved with the recipe and detailed description of the restaurants most popular dish.

Deliciously musical and sensual at the same time. Good to the very last bite!!!!

Available on Netflix if I ever choose to send this one back!

[Minger]

Another German food movie, besides Gloomy Sunday and Mostly Marta is Kebab Connection. It's goofy flick about Turkish Germans who compete for kebab primacy.

[itryalot]

I am jotting down names as people post, but there is one problem. Would it be too much to ask to write a one sentence description after it. I don't know about Tampopo, The Dinner Game and many others mentioned. All right, that is a lot to ask, I will google search each of them.

[MMRuth]

The Dinner Game is wonderful and very entertaining, but it really doesn't have anything to do with food.

[MSK]

Just saw a preview for Catherine Zeta Jone's new movie "No reservations" and thought of this thread....

Does the description of this movie sound exactly like "Mostly Martha"????

[aladria]

Saw "No Res." a couple weeks ago - the movie is rather a snore - but, nonetheless, it is kind of fun - at times - when food is involved.

[Elyssa]

I can't believe this hasn't been mentioned yet but the "Cooking in Prison" scene in Goodfellas. That's a wonderful food scene with the garlic and the sauce....mmmmmmmm!

Also 2 memorable lobster scenes with beautiful women eating them: Flashdance and Splash.

[dagrassroots]

How about the butcher scene in So I married an Axe Murderer.

[MSK]

Then there's always the lobster scene in Annie Hall......but that was the attempt to cook them, not eating them.

[maria lorraine]

Please also see
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/329236
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/335012
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/288786
and more if you do a search on movies and food.

Plus, a completely bozo story by the Chow Staff (sorry, Chow staff -- you can do much much
better than this lousy list) at
http://www.chow.com/stories/10454

ChefGirl412, the Chow story above may be the Babette's Feast link you thought was removed. It's in the Stories section.

[nallegram]

I write a column on food and drink in film called "The Celluloid Pantry" and have reported on over 60 movies so far. This list is in no way comprehensive (it's an ongoing project), but covers some classics (and some films I think deserve to be classics) not mentioned yet:

http://kitchen.apartmenttherapy.com/f...

Seems like food movies as a genre really started to really take off in the 80s with Babette's Feast, etc., but there are lots of other earlier films where food is a vital part of the plot . Certain directors really seem to like their food: Billy Wilder (The Apartment with the tennis-racket as spaghetti strainer and Sabrina with the French culinary education), Alfred Hitchcock (Rear Window with dinner delivered from the 21 Club), and Woody Allen (What's Up, Tiger Lily?, with the secret egg salad recipe, and the lobsters in Annie Hall).

[kwpy]

I have several scenes that make me want to go and eat the same food. My belief is that you cannot act eating like you can fake orgasm. Very few actors can.
Earnest borgnine eating fish soup in one of those Flint movies (James Coburn). He opens his mouth wide and soup is dark and drips from the spoon on the way to his mouth.
All the eating scenes in Jean de Florette. That's a real French country cuisine.
John Goodman in Everbody's All American. In a black community looking for a fotball player who works at a BBQ place. He sticks a whole bird in his mouth and pulls out just the bones.
I have a lot more but I should limit the space.
I have been very disappointed with a lot of the scenes mentioned before. The foods look good but most of the time they (the actors) just don't eat them like they enjoy them.

[realdeal]

Jackie Chan, slurping noodles in the street with Chris Rock...
Jackie has the slurping down, Chris can't seem to get the rythym...

[welle]

Once we're on the Jackie Chan theme. His old Drunken Master movies sure made slurping a bowl of noodles look really good.
And once we're on the HK kungfu movie theme (sorry I had a brother and male cousins while growing up in the 80s), remember the scene where Bruce Lee, while eating a bowl of rice, catches a fly with chopsticks?

[realdeal]

I love the "cooking with master chef series" with Julia, particularly the ones she did with Alice Waters...she was such a master, and really did spark the food revolution of california food...not Wolfgang, wiht some help from Jeramiah Towers.
There was this movie, i believe it was a scene from the Amazing Race, with a food fight that reminded me of a french painting of a Bocuse-esque scene in a restaurant...
Anyway, that came to mind...
Good Luck...

[rds246]

In The Mood For Love. Great film. and those noodles!

[misohungrychewlow]

How could we miss Paul Sorvino in Goodfellas, in stir, making the gravy, making sure to slice the garlic really, really thin, with a razor blade?

[Brian S]

One of the cooks in that scene is the real-life owner of NY restaurant Rao's.

[mojoeater]

What about Almodovar's "Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown?" The use of the gazpacho is very entertaining.

[McJ]

Oldboy by Korean director Park Chan-wook, has an amazing scene where the main character, after years of being a prisoner (and he doesn't know who is captives are) is released without apparent reason. One of the first things he does is go to a small restaurant where he orders something, and it is alive. He eats it alive. It is a great food scene. See the movie to find out what. The movie, (which is violent I should add), is a great film and worth it for the food alone. Food also plays a role in his vengeance.

[mojoeater]

I love that movie. Can you imagine eating the same thing for 15 years? I'd rather be tortured outright!

[ChefGirl412]

Where did you rent this movie? Thx.

[McJ]

Netflix

[welle]

It's not obvious, but 'Munich' seems to be revolving all around food. Eric Bana's character Avner is supposedly a great cook and the whole movie seems like a long series of assasination-feast-assasination-feast sequences and food looks delicious! And what about when he goes to visit Louis's family and mysterious 'Papa'? When Avner leaves their compound Papa gives him a simple brown paper wrapped package as a good-bye gift, in it Papa says "A few andouillettes and some boudin. noir, black blood sausage, and a. Loire cheese, Selles sur Cher, they. cover it in ash to preserve it." That phrase alone is worth more than all the food scenes in the whole movie!

[ChefGirl412]

Thanks...will rent this movie per your recommendation.

[FoodCad]

What about "The Freshman" (Matthew Broderick & Marlon Brando) - not exactly a food themed movie but nearly halfway thru this funny movie they introduce an absurd thread of picking up a komodo dragon that is to end up on a million dollar a plate dinner party for people that enjoy eating forbidden fruit - this thread runs to the end where the komodo dragon is brought out live to the group - but is actually a ruse to get Matthew Broderick's character free (supposedly) from Marlon Brando's character.

[ChefGirl412]

From the makers of the movie Cars, there is a sequel called Ratatouille about a chef rat coming out this summer.

[Brian S]

Pixar films are quite good. One problem about food though. I heard one of the chief Pixar guys lecture in NYC, and he said that the reason they made Toy Story was that their animation techmique, while incredibly sophisticated, made things look like plastic, so they decided to make a movie about plastic toys. So unless they have corrected this (and they might well have, Toy Story was their first) the food will look plastic!

[MSK]

Toy Story was in 1995............their process is WAY more sophisticated now.....

(PS I know the Art Director and code writer for both films)

[Brian S]

Chow.com just had a feature on it. It's coming out in June.

http://www.chow.com/grinder/2727

[Brian S]

Combination Platter was a 1993 film set in a restaurant in NY Chinatown. Yes, there's a vague plot about one of the waiters romancing a customer to get a green card, but I liked it for its depiction of Chinatown restaurant life. The mild rivalry between the Cantonese and Mandarin speaking waiters, the benevolent tyrant of an owner who exploits her workers but also provides them with valuable advice in dealing with their problems.

Oh, and continuing the Chinese restaurant theme, there's Dragon Chow, a 1987 German film part of whose plot involves two waiters at a Chinese restaurant trying to save money and open their own restaurant.

Finally, Wayne Wang's first film, the 1982 Chan is Missing, which has two Chinese cabbies searching San Francisco's Chinatown for a man who may have absconded with their money, has, as I recall, several scenes in Chinese teahouses and restaurants.

[Gary Soup]

There was a 1987 film by (Ping Pong) Po Chih Leong set in London's Chinatown, with a lot of scenes filmed in a Chinese restaurant. There was one funny scene where the waiter (and restaurant owner's son) approaches a table full of slumming London socialites and writes down everything the, are going to order before he gets to their table.

[jbyoga]

Pieces of April - a great story and a underlying food theme.

[free sample addict aka Tracy L]

Nacho Libre, lol, just kidding. Last Holiday was a good food movie with a great message. As I mentioned in a previous thread I really liked Pieces of April.

[Gourmette]

Babette's Feast (recorded years ago on VCR - watch several times a year)

Eat Drink Man Woman

Who's Killing the Great Chefs of Europe (duck press is freaky)

Like Water for Chocolate

Big Night (simple scrambled eggs at the end were a surprise)

Woman on Top

The Seduction of Joe Tynan (always remembered the food in the hotel room)

Really hope I'll have more to add to my list in the future......
Daisy

[Marilyn]

Dinner Rush
Christmas in Connecticut
Gloomy Sunday

[Sean Dell]

Oh, oh, how could I forget Marie Antoinette, Sofia Coppola's brilliant, but underlooked, film. There were more lavish food scenes than you could count. Including prodigious amounts of patisserie, all oozing creme anglaise. Yummy.

- Sean

[scarmoza]

Little Otik (Otesánek)
Dinner Rush
Jamón, jamón
Bagdad Café

[Sean Dell]

Thinking of Monty Python set me thinking of the scene in A Fish Called Wanda. I think it was Michael Palin's character who, to get himself worked up, smelt his armpits and announced 'Osso Bucco Milanese'. Wonderfully wacky, in true Monty Python style.

Then there's always Five Easy Pieces, and Jack Nicholson's famous 'toast' scene.

- Sean

[momjamin]

That must have been Kevin Kline's character, no? I haven't seen it in ages, but Jamie Lee Curtis' character loved hearing him talk in French or Italian, but of course, all he really knew was menu terms.

[kloomis]

Well- all the good ones have been mentioned, but the scene from Hannibal where he cooks up Ray Liotta's brain and serves it to him is so perverse - - also the famous line from from Silence of the lambs where Hannibal said he ate the liver of a census taker "with some fava beans and a nice chianti". He has quite an appetite that Hannibal.

[yumyumyogi]

that's pretty out there. i think he was a hound at heart.

[rds246]

"all the good ones have been mentioned"
so why not move on to the bad ones?

Mark Walhburg in The Big Hit trying to make dinner and watch the hostage
That movie with Sarah Michelle Gellar where she's a chef and then her food is magic (I'm pretty sure I actually saw such a thing on tv once in the middle of the night, as opposed to dreaming it up)

[Brian S]

Simply Irresistible (1999) And as long as we're doing bad movies, what about Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle? If Melville's Moby Dick is a metaphor for obsession, Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle may stand as a metaphor of Chowhound obsession. Too bad it's not a talented Oaxacan chef whose restaurant they are headed toward, instead of White Castle.

[meat_eater]

I like the scene if "Falling Down" where Michael Douglas' character goes into a a fast food burger joint. He orders breakfast, but he missed it by a few minutes. This prompts him to fire the automatic weapon he has on him. He then orders a big burger. But when he sees it he complains that real fast food burgers never really looks as good as those in the photographs. It found the scene really funny.

Sim
Blog: http://foodlava.com/blog/

[Sean Dell]

In Moonstruck, the marvelously written and played romance featuring Cher and Nicolas Cage, Cher's mother, at the height of the drama, cooks eggs. First she cuts a hole in a large slice of bread, pops it in a pan with olive oil, when the bread is sizzling, she breaks an egg into the hole. After a couple of minutes, she flips it.

I've been making eggs like that ever since, as a Sunday morning treat. We call them Moonstruck eggs, naturally.

- Sean

[spyturtle008]

A friend of mine used to make these for me, and called them 'flying saucers'.

[yumyumyogi]

Funny, I thought of Moonstruck as a food-oriented film, too. Nick Cage's character lost his hand baking bread! Now that's devotion to food.

Love that you named those eggs after the film.

[SweetPhyl]

We've been making them for years...with butter, not oloive oil and they're called "One Eyed Monsters" or "Frog in the Hole" Deelish...we fry the center of the bread too, just for dunking in the yolk.

[Sam Fujisaka]

(with apologies) Some anthropologist in about 1973 did a film "Chicken Soup." It was shown at the American Anthroplogy Association meetings held in New Orleans that year. B&W: an elderly woman from somewhere in Appalachia making and talking you through making chicken soup. Beautiful. Moving. Unfortunately memorable for the moment when a HUGE amount of salt was added.

[pitu]

That sounds like something documentarian Les Blank would make.
(love him)
Garlic Is As Good As Ten Mothers, for the title alone
and Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe
(there Sam, I've joined you in your obscurity!)

[Gary Soup]

You've obviously seen "Chicken Real", probably the most hilariously subversive industrial film ever made.

I've been a Les Blank buff for decades; he used to show his films at the SF Art Institute (two blocks from my house). I was actually present at the UC Theater when Werner Herzog "ate" his boot onstage (it was cooked in a big stewpot by Alice Waters, who also appears in "Garlic".). I also went to the theater premiere of "Always for Pleasure," which Blank presented in "Smellaround", which consisted of Les walking up and down the aisle waving a fan over a pot of freshly made red beans and rice while the same was being made on-screen.

http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/VideoTest...

[missclaudy]

I would have eaten MY shoe to have been present when Werner ate his. This has always been one of my Favorite documenty films of all time.

A great movie is Chulas Fronteras, a film about Tex-Mex culture.
.
The first time you see Lydia Mendoza in Les Blank’s 1976 documentary Chulas Fronteras, she’s in the kitchen of her San Antonio home making tamales. The US/Mexico border’s greatest singer of the 20th century, from a family of great singers — and one of its sole female voices — is with relatives and friends, all women laughing and loving being together, all focused on rituals of chopping and scooping, wrapping peppers and masa in tamale leaves.
A must see for anyone interested in music, Tex Mex or ANY kind of food. Blank knows that you must show a culture's food and music to get to the nitty gritty of it..His films are so lively and soulful,a great pick me up in February ,try to get your hands on them!

[Gary Soup]

You are absolutely right about CF. In a just world, it would have won an Oscar. I even bought and all but wore out the soundtrack album (I slill have it, but it's a 33-1/3 rpm disk).

[missclaudy]

I have that record too and play it on a beat up old record player. My family bought all Blank's films on video and we used to eat great food while we watched them....over and over and over...My daughter was raised watching them and has always been a very adventurous eater and lover of old fashioned Cajun and Tex Mex music AND Garlic.(Thank you Les Blank) I am not worthy! GS, great to have this in common!

Filmmaker, John Waters, paid homage to Smell-O-Vision with his 1980 film, POLYESTER. Waters created the process of Odorama and, rather than pumping in scents, used individual audience "Scratch and Sniff" cards.Some were malodorous food smells. Disgusting and Delightful!

[Tonto]

We are all too dignified to mention , well here it goes, the food fight in Animal House.

[wyf4lyf]

I still remember fondly "Who's Killing the Great Chefs of Europe?" but sadly, it's not out on DVD.

[wyf4lyf]

I was hunting around to make sure the movie is still not out on DVD (it isn't)...but did come upon inf that a remake is being made with Oliver Platt as the star. The title will be "Who Is Killing the Great Chefs?" and will come out in 2008.

[MSK]

What about the German film "Mostly Martha"?

[pescatarian]

realslowfood mentioned it above - good flick though

[free sample addict aka Tracy L]

The soundtrack was good too, but they didn't make a CD of it.

[matt]

Delicatessen is awesome.

[MSK]

Ok....so i got Delicatessen from Netflix......YuK!!!

And I just didn't get the high rating on rottentomatoes!

Plus, there really was no food/food prep in the movie...........just the illusion of meat in the package the butcher sells and the bags of grain that people are hoarding.

I usually like quirky but this was one step over!

[MC Slim JB]

You all have hit most of my favorites ("Tampopo", "Eat Drink", "Big Night", etc.), but so far no one has mentioned the romantic comedy "Woman on Top". This is a fluffly little bit of overly-sweet cinematic junk food about a Brazilian chef (played by Penelope Cruz) who finds unexpected success with an American cooking show.

What's probably funnier than the actual movie is the fact that, in our current era of Cooking Show as Blood Sport, this movie looks like a vision of innocence from another century (which, having been released in 2000, I guess it was).

I am told that "Vatel" is a worthy about-a-chef movie, though I haven't seen it. The dinner scene in "The Age of Innocence" is pretty amazing, and allegedly meticulously historically accurate.

[spyturtle008]

Speaking of dining sequences in historical(ish) movies, Marie Antoinette (due out on dvd next week) has some fun, decadent scenes featuring a plethora of baked delicacies...

[alaughingdog]

Yes, Vatel -- I'd forgotten about that one. Great recreation of the amount and quality of food required to feed royalty, sad ending...

[ChefGirl412]

Oh Wow,,,thanks everyone - I'm off to add to my Netflix queue.

[thinks too much]

Delicatessen, Fried Green Tomatoes

[yumyumyogi]

A short documentary on curry wursts in Berlin - a bit of Berlin culture + people + food:
http://www.ifilm.com/ifilmdetail/2677...

[pescatarian]

that was great - thanks for sharing

[amopdx]

Oliver Twist porridge scene "please sir, may i have some more?"

poor little guy :(

[maria lorraine]

Heck, so many food scenes in the movie "Oliver". When he first arrives in London in the food market. The early morning scene with the milk maiden, the strawberries girl -- "Will you buy any milk today?" is the song.

Actually, if you read Dickens, esp. Pickwick Papers, he was (inadvertently) a terrific food writer. Absolutely descriptive and cinegraphic.

[pescatarian]

good "food scene" = 9-1/2 Weeks (couldn't resist)

a so-so movie, but Spanglish has that great food scene where Adam Sandler makes that great egg sandwich - YUM

[Scott]

Thomas Keller gets a credit at the end of the movie for that sandwich.
http://members.cox.net/jjschnebel/Spa...

Scott

[pescatarian]

What a great link - thanks!

[OrganicGal]

Hmmm....does Eating Raoul qualify as a food movie? Especially in the Cook/Thief/Wife/Lover vein, but with more humor thrown in?

[Fydeaux]

If you're going dow that road, one might as well include the "Mr Creosote" scene from "Monty Python & the Meaning of Life".

[CindyJ]

How about that titillating feasting scene in the old (1960's) movie, "Tom Jones."

[prunefeet]

YESSSSSSSSS!!!!

[spyturtle008]

In the 301/302, Three.....Extremes, and Cook/Thief/Wife/Lover category, how about Ravenous? (The director is a vegetarian, in case you couldn't guess...)

[Gary Soup]

Here we go again....

Garlic is as Good as Ten Mothers
Dumplings: Three......Extremes
Rice Rhapsody
Life Show (about a spicy duck's necks vendor at the Wuhan Night Market).
The Chinese Feast
Werner Herzog Eats His Shoe

[realslowfood]

The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover -early Helen Mirren, beautiful food scenes.
Mostly Martha - very boring.

[AnneInMpls]

> The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover -early Helen Mirren, beautiful food scenes.

!!!!!! It's beautiful in the sense of gorgeous, lush, colorful visuals. But anyone expecting something sweet and romantic like "The Big Night" or "Like Water For Chocolate" should be cautioned - this film is a stomach-turner that's definitely not for everyone. (Me, I loved it - any film that combines scenes of rotting meat with neo-baroque music is my kind of movie!)

How about "The Peanut Butter Solution" as a food film? (A kid has a fright that scares his hair off his head, then makes a peanut butter mixture to start his hair growing again.) Except nobody eats the peanut butter...

Or "Los Enchiladas" by the late, lamented Mitch Hedberg? Action revolves around an un-named Mexican-American restaurant in St. Paul, Minnesota.

Or "La Grande Bouffe" - a French film from the '70s about several men trying to eat themselves to death.

And then there's "The Scent of Green Papaya" - a slow, poetic meditation on papaya salad (not really, but that's the image that stayed with me).

Anne

[tinymango]

a lot of people will be weirded out by la grande bouffe. it's actually sort of gross. not very gastronomically pleasurable. and dark. and perverse. and very hard to find. i got a rough little used vhs of it from amazon for like 40 bucks.

[missclaudy]

You can get it on netflix.

[Marilyn]

I have it ordered on Netflix...there's a long wait !

[prunefeet]

I wouldn't say early Mirren, being that she has been around since the sixties. But earlier Mirren and Mirren is always a good thing at any age.

[Walters]

"The Wedding Banquet" This movie is a classic in every respect and will become one of your all time favorites. I second the nomination for "The Big Night". The soundtrack is great as well.

[spyturtle008]

Not necessarily a favorite, but 301/302 would qualify...

And a second for Tampopo, which was wonderful.

[VeggieBooty]

Tampopo! Not available on netflix yet, but really, really great

[Tonto]

another great movie. What an interesting walk down memory lane this thread is.

[prunefeet]

I adore Tampopo.

[Canada Eats]

Eat Drink Man Woman (Taiwanese)

Tortilla Soup (American version of the above, and IMHO, not nearly as good, either cinematically or food-wise)

Mostly Martha

Big Night

- Lea
http://canada-eats.com

[revsharkie]

The Netflix has sent me Big Night. I think we'll watch it tonight.

[Will Owen]

I particularly loved the scene right at the end where Stanley Tucci's character is making an omelet. Just watching the effortless, casual way he beats the eggs just enough and tosses it all in the pan, I realized that Stanley Tucci really does know how to make an omelet. Some things you just can't fake.

[Gary Soup]

Are you sure he wasn't using a double?

[MSK]

The guy that trained Tony Shaloub for the movie just opened a new restaurant in Petaluma, CA. Tony and his wife came in for the opening. It was almost like life imitating art because it was a big storm and they weren't sure he was going to be able to show. He finally did.

[fougoo]

I've read about that scene. They absolutely had to have it all be one take, so Tucci had to keep doing it until that flip was perfect. Of course you can tell that he does know what he's doing....

[prunefeet]

Just watched Mostly Martha last night, and liked it a great deal.

[Tonto]

Loved it

[dogfacedboy]

http://www.chowhound.com/topics/335012

[jpschust]

Like Water for Chocolate - significantly better in spanish with english subs.

There was an asian movie a few years ago focusing on Dim Sum, can't recall the name of it.

[PastaFace123]

The Dinner Game

[revsharkie]

Chocolat

[maria lorraine]

Current thread (4/16/07) on food and movies at
http://www.chowhound.com/topics/302328