Review of The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover (1989) by Melissa . — 16 Jun 2011

Well, this was the second movie in a row I've watched that was like nothing else I had ever seen before (after Spring, Summer, Fall, Winter...and Spring yesterday). This film treats extremely lurid subject matter in an extravagantly aestheticized, high-art sort of way - think Titus Andronicus. It is, at bottom, all about sex and violence, familiar subjects to say the least, and yet treats them in a way I've really never seen another film do.

The story, which in its basic structure seems theatrical, even melodramatic, is about a loathsome British gangster who eats at a ridiculously fancy restaurant every night while his long-suffering wife cheats on him right under his nose with a bookish stranger. It's a simple story, really, and while most of the plot developments aren't especially surprising in terms of what happens, the way in which they happen is quite distinctive.

The gangster is played in a truly extraordinary performance by Michael Gambon - that's right, Dumbledore from the Harry Potter films. He's a crude, cruel, hateful swine of a human being - "boorish" would be an understatement. He practically never stops talking while he's on screen, to the point where what he's actually saying matter less than the way he is dominating everyone else in the film by means of talking. It's mind-blowing that this is the same actor who plays wise, gentle Dumbledore. Helen Mirren is also great in this movie, though she gets far fewer lines. The first few scenes with her lover are so well acted that I almost didn't notice they had no dialogue with each other. This movie also has way, way more naked Helen Mirren than I ever expected to see. Alan Howard, as her lover, mainly serves to show how much more appealing even a bland human being is than her horrible husband. I guess my major complaint about the film would be that the character of the cook (Richard Bohringer) mostly just serves as a plot device, so that the film really could have just been called "The Thief, his Wife and Her Lover." There's also a young Tim Roth as a weird, laconic henchman.

What really makes this film unlike any other is its style. The film is set almost entirely within the one fancy restaurant, which is impossibly large. The enormous sets are treated almost as if in a play or an opera, usually being filmed only from one wide angle. The camera tends to slide around from room to room in shots that can appear unbroken, but actually must be invisibly edited, because characters' lavish costumes change color according to the color scheme of the room they step into. In the red dining room, Helen Mirren's dress is red; in the white bathroom, it magically turns white. The effect is kind of like watching a living Renaissance painting - indeed, there's on tableau at a dining table that made me go Google Image The Last Supper for point of comparison. The musical score, which goes between classically styled and Danny-Elfman-esque craziness, complements the unique visual style perfectly. All of this deliberate aesthetic stateliness contrasts wildly with the depravity actually being depicted to make the film feel unique (did I mention that the film has rotting pig-heads, torture, murder, dog feces being spread all over some poor guy, and cannibalism? Well, it does). This is the first film I've seen from British writer/director Peter Greenaway, but looking at his filmography, I see that some of his other works include documentaries about painting. Well, that makes sense. I'm going to have to check out more of his works eventually. Not at all for kids or the weak of heart/stomach, but a bizarre and interesting movie.