Trilogy Week #50 - Movies About Food

Last year I posted Thanksgiving Day movies, and thought I would do it again this year, but I was surprised to find out that there are very little movies about Thanksgiving. If you know of any, give me some ideas. So instead, since we will all be eating like pigs for the holiday, why not watch some movies about food. So here are three movies that will make you hungry for some Thanksgiving day foods.

Title: Super Size Me

Year: 2004

Director: Morgan Spurlock

Cast: Morgan Spurlock

Rated: PG-13

Running Time: 1hr. 30mins.

My Review: When I heard the concept for this documentary I thought, of course he's going to gain weight, become tired, get sick, ect. ect. But that's beside the point. It's a human experiment he decided to try on himself. I sure all of us have tried something to that extent in some form or another. It's very fun to watch. It's not done with a dramatic tone that you get from the trailer. Morgan Spurlock is great, and his facts about fast food are endlessly fascinating. Very enjoyable, and you can watch it free on youtube in it's entirety. 9 out of 10 Mcgriddles

Title: Ratatouille

Year: 2007

Director: Brad Bird

Cast: Patton Oswalt, Ian Holm, Lou Romano, Brian Dennehy, Peter Sohn, Peter O'Toole, Brad Garrett, Janeane Garofalo, Will Arnett, John Ratzenberger

Rated: G

Running Time: 1hr. 51mins.

My Review: This movie was never intended to be a Pixar film. This was originally going to be a Disney film. The production at Disney was having all sorts of problems with the script, concept art, and story. By having it called "The Little Chef", and having the characters look very cartoony, it didn't work for their feel of the film. So they asked Pixar for help, and since Brad Bird was finished with the Incredibles, he was chosen for the job. To me this movie is very disappointing. It's has some big gaping plot holes (like when Remy get's food out from the fridge for Emile, instead of giving him the food that he already has, and starting that whole thing about stealing more and more food for the other rats, or the fact that Remy doesn't want Linguini to tell Colette about him under his hat, so he makes Linguini kiss Colette, but when Linguini becomes famous, he gets mad when Linguini doesn't tell the news crew about Remy... Stupid). Very bad accents (Janeane Garofalo mostly), a very corny hard to believe story (why is Linguini's body controlled by pulling his hair?), and the fact that Linguini calls Remy "little chef" makes me cringe every time I hear it. Why couldn't Linguini ask Remy if he had a name, and Remy could write it down or something. You can tell this movie was fixed with duct tape and desperation. The Trailer shows you a completely different movie, about a rat who has a problem stealing good food, and being more than who he is, that sounds more interesting to me. 5 out of 5 old ladies with shotguns

Title: Julie & Julia

Year: 2009

Director: Nora Ephron

Cast: Amy Adams, Meryl Streep, Stanley Tucci, Chris Messina, Mary Lynn Rajskub, Jane Lynch

Rated: R

Running Time: 1hr. 58mins.

My Review: I was a very weird kid, in that I used to watch cooking shows on PBS. I would watch Julia Child, The Frugal Gromet, & Yan can Cook (and let's not mention that I also would watch the New Yankee Workshop, and This Old House). So I was very interested to see how Julia became Julia. And you get a little bonus story about a women who is trying to make every dish from Julia Childs cook book. Even though I really like Amy Adams, I didn't really like her character, even though she is based on a real person, she felt too whiny, and emotional for my liking. But I really like Meryl Streep and Stanley Tucci. That was very engaging to me. And for anyone who has an interest in making food, should give this a watch. 7 out of 10 fish smothered in butter