The Taste of Things, a film by Anh Hung Tran

What a beautiful film! Every frame is sumptuous, steeped in a different time. The background is not a musical score but ambient sounds: a woodpecker, a peacock screaming, birdsong, and naturally the sounds of cooking – searing, boiling, chopping, stirring, assembling. We see patience, timing, meticulous attention to every detail, creation of complex sauces and rich dishes. All this occurs in the kitchen of a country manor owned by Dodin (Benoit Magimel). He is a “Napoleon of cuisine” according to his friends, four men who join him to dine. But the love of his life, his cook, is Eugenie (Juliette Binoche), the genius behind the food, in yet another role in which she fairly glows with inspiration and joy. 

They have a bountiful kitchen garden, neighbors, open land where hunters provide the birds of different seasons – the dappled grace of the French countryside. It is an idyll unmarred by invented conflict. Because of the film’s calm demeanor, we see depth of love expressed through cooking, a shared breakfast, a stroll in a sunny meadow. The drama of creating remarkable food is all the thrill we need – we only wish we could take our places at the table when the friends gather to dine. 

The only thing that made no sense to me was – no bread? My introduction to French food was my husband working the oven at a French bakery, hauling over a thousand baguettes out every night. To me, these crackling-from-the-700-degree-oven loaves are the epitome of French food. But there was not a baguette in sight, nor a batard. The closest we get is a boule filled with vegetables in a dense sauce – but the boule is more packaging than a food in its own right. How is this possible? 

I wept at the end. Perhaps this was due to the beauty and richness of long-developing love – or maybe it was the evocation of my own long-term love, of a man with whom I share the pleasure of good food, especially French, and the creativity manifested in the making of marvelous soups, roasts, fish in cream sauce, the meticulous efforts going into the perfection of each flavor, coaxing its finest form from every ingredient.