Love's Kitchen

I enjoyed a good deal of this film as there were so many nice little touches - like Rob driving along at a snail's pace along a country road as his wife had been killed in a road accident. I also liked how by the end of the film the two old, male customers had been educated to appreciate good food.

My main criticism is that the plot is too predictable but then that criticism could apply to almost all romantic comedies.

Anyway, thought I'd write a review because this film has nice values when so many romantic comedies of late don't. And it's not sexist which is another plus.

The screenplay is a lukewarm work just like all the actors in this movie, very loose, not quite convincing. The female food critic looked pretty forced and not convincing at all. The editing of this movie was also not quite good since there are several transit scenes just felt incomplete and abrupt.

The major problem of this movie is that the main character who played the role as an ingenious chef, again, very unconvincing, showing shortage of any superior cooking technique and basic sanitary alertness. Arranging and putting the final touch of the decoration for the food presentation, he combed his hairs, wiped his neck with the same hand that touched the food, yuck! Ever heard of cross-contamination? I was worried that he might pick his nose and scratch his crotch or his behind, then touch the food again. This is the major reason that I don't like any food that obviously was handled and touched by hands, especially if there were some obvious arrangement of the food on the plate, some greens or flowers? Nowadays, it seems every food, especially the food at outrageous prices, would be arranged by hands, French, Italian, Japanese, Chinese...lot of so-called "cuisine" are using hands to touch, arrange, re-arrange the looks on the plates. Yack! And this chef, touched food and combed his hairs and wiped his neck at the same time. His greatness in food never showed clearly only showed that he could do some magical "Trifle", in other words, a pastry chef? Lot of scenes in this lukewarm romance comedy are just pretentious and stupid. Highly unlikely realistic.

Watchable, but not great at all.

As I have learnt from the multitude of reality TV cooking shows which make regular appearances in the Malone household, the secret to a good dish is carefully selecting fresh ingredients and balancing the different flavors together in order for them to all work in harmony on the plate. However in Love's Kitchen they do things in a different way. Essentially chucking a bunch of old, out of date and re-heated ideas into the mixing bowl, bunging it in the oven and after 90 mins they have produced an under-cooked, half-baked idea of film, devoid of any real flavour or substance.

Love's Kitchen tells the lukewarm tale of successful chef and restaurateur Rob Haley (Dougray Scott) who looses all passion for food after the tragic death of his wife in a car accident. A scathing review of his restaurant leads to a cringe worthy intervention by Gordon Ramsey, before our Rob heads off to the countryside and buys The Boot, an old country pub which his late wife fell in love with before her untimely demise and is now frequented by an American food critic (Claire Forlani). Here Rob proceeds to try and recapture his love for food and turn around both the culinary and fiscal fortunes of The Boot. So it appears as if Love's Kitchen is essentially a 90 minute episode of Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares, which just in case you were wondering, that's not a good thing.

Most rom-coms are predictable, so much so that you can sketch out the plot within the first 5 mins or so of meeting the characters. Why some work and others don't is how much the audience grows to like and invest in the two leads. I am big rom-com fan and a huge admirer of a happy ending. I don't mind it being telegraphed, but I want to enjoy the journey. I need to want the couple to be together at the end of the film. Within 5 mins of watching Love's Kitchen I wanted to take a spatula and start slapping people around the face.

Everything about the film felt forced. It felt as if they had studied what had worked in Four Weddings or Notting Hill and tried to recreate it piece by piece. Bringing together a British chap and an American lass has always worked well in the past, but this time the main leads are simply unconvincing with precious little chemistry together. They didn't seem suited to each other at all, so you just didn't care what happens to them.

The supporting cast fared little better and appeared to be the dregs of out of work British soap opera actors. Eastenders was well represented and I almost fell of my chair when Nigel from Brookside turned up. I am sure if I had looked hard enough I probably would have found an extra from Crossroads somewhere in the background. There were moments when I couldn't believe what I was watching and hearing. The script sounded like it had come from a Carry On film and some of the characters felt like a cross between caricatures of English country folk and characters from Viz (get ooorffff my land!!) . At times I felt embarrassed for the cast, but mostly I just wanted it to stop.

First time writer/director James Hacking did learn one good thing from Four Weddings though and that was Simon Callow. He is star of this film and simply delightful as a boozed up food critic, quite reminiscent of Keith Floyd. I could have happily have watched a film just about him.

Apparently when then film opened to a small select 5 screens, it only took 121 GBP in its opening weekend, making it one of the lowest UK openings of all time. You can see why.

I know that cheap has a negative connotation. This film indeed suffers from a low (cheap) budget but this movie isn't as bad as many people try to claim on IMDb. Perhaps, it'll get a more fancy remake someday. Then this original will be positively reevaluated. Until that date, you might want to form your own opinion.

Rob Haley (Dougray Scott) is a successful chef in London left heartbroken when his wife is killed in a car accident. His restaurant 'The World's End' suffers a deadly review and business dries up. His friend Gordon Ramsay is horrified at his state. Rob visits the sleepy country pub that his wife was going to buy and meets American food critic Kate Templeton (Claire Forlani). She's moved back in with her English father estrange since she was 12 after the failure of her relationship. He rediscovers the love of food, gathers up a couple of his old kitchen crew, and buys the rundown pub. It's a horribly slow start. Then Kate tries his food. Food critic Guy Witherspoon (Simon Callow) comes by.

I really hate the Gordon Ramsay cameo. It takes me completely out of the movie. This is a simple predictable rom-com. I'm not railing against rom-com clichés. They're clichés for a reason. For a foodie rom-com, this needs much more food porn. Personally I love the visual delights of food porn. That's the one element missing here. The leads are perfectly lovely. The evil people are perfectly douche like. The little girl should be younger and cuter. It's not aiming for much and that's what it does.