The Taste Of Things (2023)

 

Genre: Romance/ Drama

Time: 2h 20mins

Director: Tran Anh Hung

Quick Summary: The story of Eugenie, an esteemed cook, and Dodin - the fine gourmet chef she has been working for over the last 20 years.

About 10 minutes into the film I realised I was incredibly hungry 

Food porn. For the majority of this, it's food porn and it's glorious. Gourmet meals are made in the most aesthetically pleasing ways where you can hear every little sound. There's no music which, I thought was a little bit odd at first until I actually ended up really appreciating it because hearing all the sizzling, scrapes, sliding, and other sounds was wonderful. You get to see how much work actually goes into one dish, coming from the garden outside all the way until it's actually served. The dishes themselves are mouthwatering and extremely fancy, but look delicious. 

The setting was done incredibly well too. 1889, France. All the lighting looked natural, beautiful landscapes and the interior was simple, but yet really helped with the setting. Now I'm not 100 per cent sure, but the dishes all seemed to be relative to the time, even though they were gourmet, the techniques used and how everything was stored match pretty well to my common knowledge, especially the use of multiple people in the kitchen to do one dish since they were all pretty complicated back then. 

Now this isn't just food porn, there's actually a really sweet romance. We see the couple share their love together through food and through food. They constantly talk about food and other meals they're thinking of cooking. Then seeing their passion being put into their craft together is also pretty sweet. However, It was so adorable watching them make food for each other. The sheer amount of care and love that went into them is admirable. 

But, that said, as soon as it stopped being about the food, it got boring. Really boring. I don't remember what they even spoke about when it wasn't about food. This is where I disliked the silence. I feel like it needed something more to keep my attention, as I didn't care about them enough to want to listen to their casual conversation. 

While this is good food porn and very pretty to look/ listen to, there isn't much to it. I'm sure more people will probably be more invested in the romance side of this, but it felt dull to me. 

5/10