Review of Burnt (2015) by Olivier B — 25 Jan 2016

Burnt is the story of a disgraced, all-star chef who's looking for redemption and the chance to obtain his third Michelin star (a chef's highest honour) by re-vamping a dwindling restaurant and repaying his debts; though his temper is a detriment to his success.

The film stars Bradley Cooper who underwent extensive culinary training to realistically portray the chef and appear professional; though I will say he may have borrowed too much inspiration from Gordon Ramsey, who also executive produced the film.

Bradley Cooper is very strong here, though his character is completely unlikeable with his constant shouting and berating of his staff; so they force in a generic romance story with Sienna Miller (who's also quite good) to soften him up, which was irritatingly simple.

The supporting cast is pretty solid too with Daniel Bruhl, Emma Thompson, Omar Sy, and very brief appearances from an almost unrecognizable Uma Thurman, Lily James, and the amazing Alicia Vikander; the film is not lacking in star-power.

The attention to detail and workman-like approach to filming the culinary aspects is masterful, but the film does fall short in the story department as it's far too conventional and you've seen this type of redemption story far too often.

There is a great "mic drop" surprise near the end that I truly didn't see coming, and that was pretty awesome, but everything else is fairly predictable. It's not as bad as critics are saying, but it's certainly not original and feels a bit mechanical, where a similar food-central film, Chef, has the whole package.