La Clair: 'The Menu' is a film full of delectable satire and ethereal food

Foodies inherently have a deep and abiding interest in all things food. I enjoy seeing how food springs from various cultures, how it impacts traditions and holidays and how food even makes its way into art. Art created with food, such as pudding finger paintings when we were in kindergarten, haven't particularly interested me, but movies where food is the leading character, well those, those are intriguing.

When I first saw the movie trailer for "The Menu", I was hooked. It stars Anya Taylor-Joy, whose doe-eyed beauty is unusual and striking. She can do quiet rage so well and unlike many stars nowadays, I can remember the first time I saw her face. She is that memorable, and she is also that good. I believe her. "The Menu" also stars Ralph Fiennes; do I really need to say more? Let me try to tell you about how much I enjoyed this movie without ruining it for you.

It is billed as a horror comedy, and as I sit here pondering if that is true, I'm still not sure. Yes, there is violence, shocking and graphic, although more in a realistic way than in a slasher-film-blood-fountain way. This kind of violence is, to me, more distressing than the over-the-top gratuitous scare fests, because this kind of violence has a better chance of actually happening in the real world. There is also swearing. The movie is rated R, so be warned.

The comedic part of the movie is so foodie-based that, until I watched it through, I wasn't sure how it would hit someone who wasn't a foodie. Then I realized that there is a little bit of a foodie in us all. If you've ever watched Gordon Ramsey, or Emeril Lagasse, or heck, even Julia Childs, then you will know enough to appreciate the foodie humor.

The movie opens with a youngish, hip couple on their way to a $1,500-a-plate meal. The man is much more enthusiastic about the meal, nay, "Experience," with a capital "E." He chides the woman for smoking on the way, telling her that the smoke will kill her palate and she needs to be able to detect all of the nuances in the cooking. He talks with annoying superiority about "mouthfeel" and "flavor profiles". He uses all the food snob buzzwords, and each time he did it, I chuckled.

When they arrive, the courses of the meal start coming, introduced by the inestimable Ralph Fiennes as a world-famous chef. With his entire team visible and working behind him, he introduces each dish, then the screen cuts to a beauty shot of the food. The food's name and each ingredient featured on it is listed on screen, and some of them made me laugh even though things kept getting weirder and odder and then wrong and finally horrifying.

You will see all sorts of interesting food that had to be created and filmed for this movie: laces, foams and ingredients harvested from the rarest this and the most expensive that. Many chefs placed small pieces of food with magnifying glasses and tweezers so that nothing is out of place. This is food as art, and "The Menu" shows us just how far this trend has gone, and how pretentious it can be.

For the beauty shots, David Gelb, the man responsible for "Chef's Table" on Netflix was hired. He has mastered the fine art of taking an amazing food photo, and the movie wanted to get their "food porn" shots just right. In addition, they wanted the actors to actually enjoy the food they were eating, so a whole list of chefs came together and created dishes that not only looked beautiful, but tasted beautiful as well.

This is definitely a black comedy, dark and dismal, absolutely skewering the worship of food and the rise of food snobs and their egos, and yet, there is a touch of the tenderness that existed in "Ratatouille", another excellent film about food. Above all, "The Menu" is a fresh idea, not another sequel or remake. Hollywood can still make original movies, and, it seems, still has stories to tell. If you enjoy food as more than fuel, if you marvel at the creations of masters and wonder about how it might all taste, if you enjoy a little discomfort and tongue-in-cheek violence in your movies, try "The Menu". Let me know if you laughed when you shouldn't have, and then we can feel guilty together.