Une affaire de goût

This movie isn't a whodunit, since we know from the start pretty much what happens--it's just a question of WHY? And the movie answered that question to my satisfaction. Interesting and plausible psychologically, and the food presentations woven throughout are mouth-watering. Best of all to a non-native French speaker, I found it fairly easy to understand all the dialogue.

The meaning of "taste" is in question throughout. Previous comments center only on psychopathology or cinematography, with little mention of language. I think the variable meanings of words, whether the French dialogue or the English subtitles, is the key to understanding this rather transparent but mildly engaging film.

The most obvious example has to do with the title, of course. When "taste" of any sort runs headlong into a wall of insensate and objective laws or rules of behavior, it is reduced to meaningless metaphor. Individuality is thus ultimately rendered a nullity. That is the central meaning of the film.

Self-destruction brought about by some sense of one's inability to achieve a perfect harmony with another's unique personality has therefore nothing and yet everything to do with "taste." It is as well the essence of narcissism.

This film could have been conceived and produced only in France.

I actually enjoyed this smooth and somehow predictible thriller from former TV-show host bernard Rapp (ok, he is a film maker now, this movie prooves that). It reminded me that you eat very well in the good old city of Lyon. What else can I say ? A little Chabrol (Claude)-style maybe. The acting is okay, I specialy enjoyed Bernard Giraudeau. It was a pleasure to see again Jean-Pierre Leaud (the "antoine Doisnel" of François Truffaut's 400 blows).

Bernard Rapp's "Une affaire de gout" has an unusual take on the controversial and sensational subject of homosexual love and passion:the leitmotif is food and the eroticism is more on the psychological than on the physical side.

A big-shot businessman employs a young and good-looking waiter to be his "taste-tester," as he is extremely meticulous when it comes to food quality, suspects that someone might put his life on danger by poisoning him, and is particularly averse to cheese and fish.He pays the young man a hefty salary, shelters him in a nice and comfy mansion and subjects him to a rigorous "fasting" and "asceticism"---in the process, he becomes the businessman's most trusted and influential right-hand man.The young man is all too willing to let all this pass,as, according to him, he wants to be absorbed in the tycoon's "craziness."

In the course of the film, we learn that the tycoon harbors a deep-seated pain and trauma, for his father died of drowning brought about by a ship mishap as he was about to bring them home some "cheese" and when his body was found, it was discovered to have been eaten by "fish" (thus, the businessman's aversion to them).

Therefore, we may reasonably assume that by having his food tasted first by the young man, the businessman is seeking once again the approval and assurance of a father-figure (though admittedly much younger than him)---the things which he never had because of his father's untimely death.

Or, conversely, the wealthy man is trying to act out the role of a caring and concerned father to the guy, a kind of living up to the legacy of his late father so that his death may not be so much of a burden and a source of guilt for him.

But, as the relationship between the two men is pathological in nature, it reaches the point where the wealthy man starts insulting and eventually abandons among the rags the young man, culminating in a tragic event that, in a different mode and context, makes the former suffer the same fate as his father.

With this, "Une affaire de gout" feels like a case history by Freud or, in some respects, by Menninger, as the homoerotic element is subtly manifested in certain forms of behavior and action that the characters take, whether they're aware of it or not, and the instances wherein they injure themselves or suffer from certain kinds of organic illness suggest a form of self-destruction that they're covertly aiming at, both as a means of punishment (for some "guilty" and "immoral" act) and a source of pleasure (serving as an "outlet" for homoerotic impulses and cravings).

Well, I guess it's "a matter of taste" whether one can accept the film's revealing and disturbing premises or not.

This is a very unconventional and one of the more "un-Hollywood" films I have seen in quite some time. It is a somewhat slow-moving story about one strange rich man and the way he gradually seduces another man in a seemingly non-sexual way. The acting and writing are excellent, but what I really like are the MANY many ways that the movie can be interpreted and nothing is completely spelled out for the viewer. Some will no doubt find this maddening, but I thought this made the film a dandy psychological study. You are left with so many possible questions such what exactly was psychologically wrong with the rich guy (clinically, he's pretty hard to pin down), is the poor guy also out of his mind, was there deliberate mind control, did the rich guy plan the film's conclusion all along and was there some sort of homosexual undercurrent. I'm sure if you see the film, you'll have even more questions. And, for me, I like this ambiguity--it makes for a great movie to discuss with your friends.