Der Koch, der Dieb, seine Frau und ihr Liebhaber

The cruel and sadistic crime boss Albert Spica (Michael Gambon) has dinner every night in his restaurant with his wife Georgina Spica (Helen Mirren) and his gang. Albert abuses of his wife, his gangsters, the chef Richard Borst (Richard Bohringer) and the restaurant employees.

When Georgina meets the gentle bookseller Michael (Alan Howard) in the restaurant, they have a torrid affair in the restroom and in the store, and they are covered by Richard. However the prostitute Pat discloses to Albert that he has been betrayed by Georgina and Albert kills Michael. However Georgina plots revenge against Albert with the support of Richard and the victims of Albert.

"The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover" is one of the most grotesque, eschatological, bizarre and weird films that I have ever seen. But it is also absolutely original and mesmerizing, with intense use of colors, and with the contrast of vulgarity and art. Food, eschatology, sex, cruelty, torture, cannibalism and revenge are entwined along 124 minutes running time. The result is not pleasant and only specific audiences will appreciate this film. Last time I had seen this film was on 08 September 2000 on VHS. My vote is eight.

Title (Brazil): "O Cozinheiro, o Ladrão, Sua Mulher e o Amante" ("The Cook the Thief, His Wife and the Lover")

Imagine the universe as a restaurant. The parking lot is the world. The kitchen is purgatory. The ladies's room is heaven. The dining room is hell. Hell is ruled over by Albert Spica, (Satan) excellently played by Michael Gobon. Dante is Michael (Alan Howard) a cataloger of French books. Beatrice, Dante's perfect woman, Georgina Spica (Helen Mirren) who is married to the devil.

In the beginning, the cook (God) in the real world is seen kicked and smeared and fed dog feces by Gabon. He is humiliated and in tears, but He endures and eventually helps to further the love between Howard and MIrren. Sex, in its pure form, is looked at as something sacred. Gabon lords over everyone in his realm with a tyrant's fist, caring nothing about anyone or anything. He wants two three things out of life—superiority to all other being, food and sex, while Mirren, as a reluctant Persephone, sneaks off to be with Howard. A couple of times Gabon even finds his way into the sanctity of heaven, but this is only short-lived.

The mood of the film is dark-black, heralded by brilliant reds or greens, and the tenor of an angelic child throughout. Every image is like a painting. Emotions creep in from all directions.

This is a film that would never, no matter what year it was produced, have won an Academy Award. It is too refined, to subtle, too sensual, too intelligent.

Watch it, rent it, buy it. It must be seen.

'The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, & Her Lover' is a film about politics, cannibalism, vomit, love, death, betrayal, and torture. 'The Cook the Thief His Wife & Her Lover' is part black comedy, part crime thriller, part horror, part film-noir. It is about about four twisted characters and a series of events that play out over an entire week. The owner of a French restaurant, Albert Spica(the thief), occupies it daily in order to stuff his face and beat on the innocent bystanders that surround him and cannot touch him. The owner of the restaurant(the cook) constantly watches in awe as Albert Spica humiliates everyone and talks and talks and talks, yet says nothing. The thief's wife, Georgina(his wife), is beaten, raped, and humiliated every day by the thief. She falls in love with another man at another table, Michael(her lover), and begins to have a rather passionate affair with him. What results is one of the most outrageous and bizarre films I've ever seen.

Peter Greenaway has created a film that is unlike anything that has ever been made before. It is a film that is so disgusting and dark and tasteless, and yet so beautiful and intelligent and fresh that it must be seen to be believed. All of the performances are unforgettable, especially Helen Mirren as the wife, in a heart wrenching performance. Michael Gambon is absolutely terrifying as the thief. People can discuss the political implications that the film implies all they want. I really don't care about that stuff though. Even if that's what the film is about, it isn't why I love it. I love it because it challenges me and a way a challenging film should.

The attention to detail in the set-pieces depict the one pertaining to the outrageous and decadent nature of our time and the times in which we live where the thief consumes everything and is wasteful. As a result, there is a genuine sense of true horror throughout the film. The graphic violence and sex only add the the dark nature of the depiction of a world, long destroyed by the greedy punks that have overrun the world. The punks in this film are much older than the ones that are usually depicted, and we the post-apocalyptic world outside for many brief glimpses in which there is a lot of fog, smoke, grime, and filth. We really get a sense that the world that is depicted in this film was once truly beautiful and open to possibility, and the fact that it is a world that is long gone makes the film far more tragic than we would usually expect, especially one with such grand texture and such a dark sense of humor.

This is the kind of film that reminds me that people in the film industry can still make intelligent, smart, and brilliant films without having to pile on the excess. The film works because it is not only effective, but it is also original storytelling. The film's use of it's set design only amplifies the way it is presents and gives the film even more meaning with it's vibrant colors and the way that each set piece in the entire film represents a different color of the rainbow. The music by Michael Nyman is simply one of the most chilling and unforgettable scores I've heard in a film. It only enhances the beauty of the film though.

While the film is certainly not for everyone, especially children(although it won't be easy for them to view it given it's NC-17 rating), this film is for the kind of adult audience who likes to think and not just be shown something that will waste their time. The content is really tame compared the garbage that is allowed to be played on public television these days anyway. For people who want to be challenged and shown a film that will make them think about the world in a different way than they normally do, It's a must see. This is one of my personal favorite films.

With the Cook, the Thief, his Wife and her Lover, Greenaway creates a self-contained world that is both a fabrication and abstraction of reality, but also an extremist reflection (nee, microcosm) of British society in the nineteen-eighties. The characters that he chooses to put forward to the audience as protagonists are archetypes of social and political caricatures that we would find in that particular decade; but heightened to conform to the over-the-top opulence/pestilence found central to the plot. His ability to craft characters and situations that resonate beyond the context of a particular scenario, coupled with his bitterness and unwillingness to conform is what sets him up as a satirist of serious note. He also elevates the film beyond the realms of mere art-house experimentation by fashioning a seriously funny script, which has ample opportunities for central character Albert Spica to prove himself the ultimate charismatic bully - part cockney hard man, part pantomime villain - who is never less than compulsively terrifying.

The plot is a simple construct centred on the theme of revenge and the need for personal freedom. This is mixed in with the socio-political undertones as well as Greenaway's many references to art, theatre, film and literature. It is also elevated by the impeccable cinematic qualities that we hold synonymous with the director's work. Everything here is about pushing things beyond the reasonable limitations; so we have a stunningly intricate set that is both theatrically simplistic, but also as other-worldly as anything from the work of say Gilliam or Jeunet. The costumes by Jean Paul Gaultier scream over-the-top chic, whilst often mirroring the use of colour employed by the production designers. Greenaway even breaks continuity by having Helen Mirren's costumes change colour as she moves through each room of the restaurant, so that we have a green dress in the kitchen, a red dress in the dinning area (inspired by Hitchcock's vertigo no less) and a white dress in the lavatory. It's an audacious move, but one that pays off in the creation of a completely self-contained world; something that is further established by Sacha Vierny's sumptuous cinematography and the wonderfully bombastic music of the ever-excellent Michael Nyman.

Some have clearly found the film's various abstractions problematic (yes, it is theatrical, yes it is occasionally shocking, and yes, it does evolve in a world of its own ostentatious creation). But it's also as artistic a film as you can get; a fact that some here have disputed. The reason that some define this as artistic refers to the use of colour, light and composition. The architecture of the sets too, and the way in which the production designers have chosen to dress them also adds to the artistic stylisation of the film. These factors are important to the narrative, as they are symbolic to what Greenaway is trying to convey, as well as what the characters are all about. Because of this, the design of the film becomes AS important as the framework, if not more so. But this film is more than a mere arty exploration; it's funny and intelligent and features a slew of great performances from a wonderfully eclectic cast. Michael Gambon as the thief Spica gives a grandstand performance to rival his own Phillip Marlow from The Singing Detective; hamming things up spectacularly but still retaining that much needed sense of humanity. The same can be said of the other principals too.

Mirren as the wife exudes a quite and restrained sexuality in what must be her best performance, whist Richard Bohringer as the cook is in some represents the linchpin/catalyst for the film. Elsewhere we find everyone from Tim Roth to Ian Dury popping up to give the film some added character and easily furthering the film's already cult appeal. This was a turning point for Greenaway; a move towards the more expressive, elaborate and self-contained style of film-making found in films like Prospero's Books and the Baby of Maçon and away from the more easy to digest classics like the Draughtsman's Contract, Drowning by Numbers and A Zed and Two Noughts.

This contains spoilers.

OK... so some people think this thing is ART. I don't get it.

The film's basic story is old: a bored woman wants to escape her rich, dominating, unfeeling and unintelligent husband and has an affair with a poor but sensitive man. Husband finds out and seeks revenge. Wife retaliates. This plot line has been done MANY times. Yawn.

The graphic violence is gratuitous and adds nothing to the film's story except to over emphasize how brutal the world of this couple is, show how mean the husband is, AND to give the "enlightened" movie "critics" something to which they can point as evidence that this is not a film for the "average" audience. The violence is so overdone, however, that its shock value wears off quickly, and the climactic "banquet" scene therefore has no real impact on the now numbed audience. Yawn.

The cinematography, lighting, costumes, sets, featured art pieces, and almost all visual aspects of the film are spectacularly lush - but like a heavy, rich meal they tend to overpower and make one sleepy or not very alert. What the point of the color changes in the costuming between the dining room, lavatory, kitchen, and garage sets was meant to do except to work as a gimmick to wake up the audience - or give more fodder to the "enlightened" ones who wanted to claim that this was something only those in tune with "Art" could understand - is never disclosed. Yawn.

In the end, only those who claimed to be "enlightened" applauded the film as a work of "Art". The rest of us unwashed masses either woke up when the "enlightened" ones applauded or numbly sat in our seats wondering why we spent money and wasted time to see this "artistic" piece of trash.