Review of The Hundred-Foot Journey (2014) by Tom H — 15 Mar 2015

Lasse Halstrom returns to food in his latest film, in which the moral is that success means nothing without love and food is the gateway to memories.

The film is not as divine as his earlier film Chocolat but looks every inch as good. A fairly low key cast out with Oscar winner Dame Helen Mirren and Om Puri do a solid job of entertaining us, though at times the film did feel laborious could they not have edited it to 100 minutes?

The Hundred Foot Journey uses similar tropes or plot points rather which were used in Chocolat. For example the Kadam family are similar to the Gypseys of Chocolat, as when the Kadam's are forced to flea India they can't really settle in Europe until they reach France. In Chocolat Alfred Molina tried to drive away Juliette Binoche. This time we have Helen Mirren trying to drive away the Indian's.

After one conflict goes too far the star cook of the Kadams' Hassan (played zestfully by Manish Dayal) decides to work for Mirren, it's established he's got potential early on and Mirren helps him realise it. He becomes a success but longs for the girl Marguerite (the delectable if slightly bland Charlotte Le Bon) whom he fell for when he landed in France. Do you think they get their happy ending?

I really wanted to give this film a three Michelin stars in truth it's a one Michelin star film, it's just a solid and well made film the type Halstrom can make in his sleep. It has it's comedic moments but it's not quite as good as we have come to expect from Halstrom.

Overall worth a watch when it comes out on Netflix or which streaming service you use but not a keeper.