Harockerce What a beautiful movie!

ReaderKenka Let's be realistic.

Freaktana A Major Disappointment

Senteur As somebody who had not heard any of this before, it became a curious phenomenon to sit and watch a film and slowly have the realities begin to click into place.

mallaverack This is not a bad film - with food prepared in such a grand setting as the Elysee Palace, we have the right ingredients for a movie of interesting visuals, but apart from this, everything else about "Haute Cuisine" is fairly lacklustre. Catherine Frot is terrific as chef Hortense but only within the context of her description and preparation of food. We learn very little about her and perhaps the chief reason being that this movie is virtually without a plot - despite initially foreboding deep conflict and resentment from other kitchen staff (entirely male), this is barely alluded to let alone shown. The flash-forwards to Hortense's next job at an outpost in Antarctica does very little to propel either plot or characterisation. I kept waiting for this side-story to shine some relevance on either plot or character but it failed to do so. The meetings between chef and president were very few and again, little was learnt from the conversations apart from the president's preference for simple, old-style cooking. I think viewers will be disappointed that this film promised understandable conflict of character and style and failed to deliver.Having said this, the film can still be enjoyed as an interesting expose on a style of cooking and its preparation.

richard-1787 No one is going to nominate this as one of the 10 greatest movies of x. There is nothing cutting edge here, etc.It is, however, an interesting story well told and very well acted, especially by Catherine Frot, who seems to do everything well. I've seen it twice now, and never once looked at my watch. It really holds you.In part, of course, it is because it presents what is now, at least in part, a dying part of traditional French culture: a respect for food in all its potential richness, and a willingness to spend the time necessary to make and appreciate it. The meals that Hortense prepares aren't frou-frou. They don't, as the president says at one point, have little sugar roses on them. It's not how clever it looks.It's how interesting the mixture of tastes are, an attention to taste and the freshness of ingredients that is necessary for those tastes, that French tradition holds to have been the gift of every good grandmother - NOT of expensive Parisian restaurants.This could be compared to the wonderful but very American movie *Ratatouille*. Near the end of that, the evil food critic Anton Ego goes into ecstasy over a portion of ratatouille because it evokes the ratatouille that his mother used to make. A pretty simple dish. Not, granted, mac and cheese, but still, not complicated.The dishes Hortense makes for le président, which repeatedly evoke memories of childhood, are NOT simple. They require both a lot of time and a lot of technique/knowledge regarding their preparation. That French grandmother did not make them in 15 minutes, but rather several hours, or even days for the preparation. It is, in short, a different vision of how grandmother spent her time, one that in each case is, I suspect, filtered through the values of the respective cultures. (TIME and KNOWLEDGE make for good food, vs. love makes for good food.) I don't know if this all comes through in English subtitles. My copy of the film has no subtitles. But it's definitely worth a viewing. It didn't make me hungry - I can't imagine having access to such meals here in the U.S. - but it did emphasize that, even for a bunch of young Frenchmen such as those at the French base in Antarctica, there is still a respect for time and skill in food preparation that is one of the distinguishing hallmarks of French culture.

shawneofthedead Have you ever caught yourself planning where to have dinner… even while you're eating lunch? Singapore, as all who live here know very well, is a nation obsessed with good food. As far as humanly possible, many of us live to eat, rather than eat to live. So it's easy to see how a treat like Haute Cuisine – a thoroughly French film that greatly reveres the art and mastery of cooking – might hit the spot with local audiences.No-nonsense, straight-talking Hortense Laborie (Catherine Frot) – inspired by the real-life Danièle Mazet-Delpeuch – runs her own truffle farm in the French countryside. One day, she's rushed down to Paris to meet a potential employer: the President of France (Jean d'Ormesson), who's modelled after François Mitterrand. With the help of her sous-chef Nicolas (Arthur Dupont), Hortense prepares culinary feasts for a man who hankers after the down-to-earth home cooking of his childhood, even as she's forced to deal with politics and jealousy in the kitchens and corridors of the Élysée Palace.As a main course, Haute Cuisine serves up much for discerning movie- goers to savour. Hortense emerges as a formidable presence, her strength of character shining through her battles with the unwelcoming men in charge of the Palace's main kitchen. (Mazet-Delpeuch was the first female chef to serve in the Palace.) Her conspiratorial friendships with Nicolas and Jean-Marc Luchet (Jean-Marc Roulot), the President's maître d, are charmingly developed and effectively juxtaposed with her year-long sojourn in Antarctica spent cooking for a very different set of consumers. The film is beautifully shot, making good use of its access to the Palace grounds and lingering lovingly over Hortense's culinary masterpieces.Just don't expect to have your mind blown or your tastebuds completely tantalised. This is a competent, solidly-made film, but it trades a sense of dramatic urgency for its more gastronomic delights. Hortense's creations will have you salivating in your seat, rich and clearly delicious. Her few face-to-face meetings with the President, however, are sweet and understated rather than the stuff of history. Ultimately, Haute Cuisine is the cinematic equivalent of a good, solid meal – satisfying but not necessarily something to shout from the roof-tops about.

Mozjoukine The subject is OK and unfamiliar and 'Scope Eastmancolor production values are handsome - the close-ups of food are near obscenely gorgeous.Catharine Frot and the cast (largely unfamiliar abroad, even with Hipolyte Gyradot in there) impress though the eighty five year old TV personality fronting as President of the French Republic does seem a bit too fragile and we have to wonder about the accent of the Australian TV reporter pursuing Catharine. The Elysses Palace and the remote Iceland expedition are intriguingly shown. However we are left wanting the revelation, which they build up cross cutting the two situations, and it never arrives, stopping this from being more than a pleasant enough offering for the LADIES IN LAVENDER audience.