We saw an excellent comedy tonight. Chef, was a combination food film and feel-good comedy. Jon Favreau is Chef Casper, a mercurial food star, fed up with the predictable but popular food that his boss wants him to cook. After a savage review by an effete critic, he breaks with the boss. At loose ends and needing to reconnect to his 10 year old son who lives with his mom, Chef borrows money from his ex-wife’s latest ex to buy a food truck and take both conventional Cuban favorites and his own creations on a road tour. Teaming up with a former employee (John Leguizamo) and his son, the truck is a big success on its pilgrimage from Florida to California.
Yeah, this definitely counts as a “feel-good” movie, in which a divorced guy has a good relation with his rich, beautiful ex (Sofia Vergara), a cute kid, and lots of adoring food-fans, but it’s a really enjoyable, good natured, feel-good movie. In addition, about a third of the movie is Chef doing the cooking and the Cuban/original food just looks great, made me really hungry. There’s lots of good music and good cheer along the road, and it has a happy ending. The theater was filled and the audience loved it (including me). There are several celebrity cameos, including Dustin Hoffman as the predictable boss, Scarlet Johansson as a waitress and friend at the old restaurant, Robert Downey as his ex-wife’s ex and Oliver Platt as the cynical reviewer. If you need some light entertainment after a long week in front of the computer, this could be it. Rotten Tomatoes is currently showing it as a stellar 88% for critics and 90% for audiences, so I guess I can’t be completely off base. I do have to note that the trailer suggests that the stars are Downey and Scarlett, but they really are minor characters
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wgFws3AoIUY
