Directed by: Mary Mylod
Written by: Seth Reiss, Will Tracy
Cast: Ralph Fiennes, Anya Taylor-Joy, Nicholas Hoult, Hong Chau
The Menu starring Ralph Fiennes (Chef Slowik), Anya Taylor-Joy, and Nicholas Hoult, was an interesting movie and definitely not what I was expecting!
Margot (Anya Taylor-Joy) and Tyler (Nicholas Hoult), along with several other patrons, take a boat ride to an island where an ultra-exclusive restaurant called Hawthorn awaits them. Upon their arrival at the island, they are greeted by Elsa (Hong Chau), who gives them a tour of the island on the way to the restaurant. She shows them the smokehouse and bunkhouse while politely answering questions about burnout by letting them know that “nothing here is burnt unless it’s on purpose.” Elsa doesn’t kid around.
While Tyler is incredibly excited about this opportunity to dine at this expensive (over a thousand dollars a plate) restaurant, Margot is less than thrilled. Joining them are food critic Lillian (Janet McTeer) and her editor Ted (Paul Adelstein), Richard (Reed Birney) and his wife Anne (Judith Light), Movie Star – yes that is the character’s name, Movie Star (John Leguizamo) and his assistant Felicity (Aimee Carrero), and tech bros Soren (Arturo Castro), Bryce (Rob Yang), and Dave (Mark St. Cyr).
A few details about these guests: Lillian claims that she put Chef Slowik on the map, Richard and his wife think they know Margot from somewhere and have been to Hawthorn eleven times already, Movie Star has been in some terrible movies, and the tech bros are an obnoxious bunch of guys who work for a man named Doug Varick, who owns Hawthorn which of course makes them feel entitled.
Now on to the staff. The staff at Hawthorn clearly revere Chef Slowik. They are almost robotic with a call and response before every course. They appear to be the best of the best, and they really put Chef Slowik up on a pedestal.
Once everyone is seated, the serving can begin. Let me just say that I don’t know if I would eat the food that was served. I think it looked weird and gross personally. There was stuff on rocks, weird foamy stuff, fermented goo, a lot of stuff from the ocean, bleeccchhh. But if you like that sort of thing, then maybe you would like the fancy food at Hawthorn. Margot certainly didn’t like it, and that offended Chef Slowik. He took everything about his food personally, which I can kind of understand, especially if you dedicated your whole life to creating and preparing these exclusive experiences for people.
I would describe The Menu as a dark comedy. There were definitely some darkly humorous moments in this film. I kept wondering when the terrible twist would happen. I won’t spoil anything in this review though. I enjoyed it, and I’m looking forward to watching it again!
