Haute Cuisine

An exquisitely French film for the foodies, Haute Cuisine draws upon the memoir of the first woman to cook for French President Mitterrand at the Elysée Palace during the 1980s…

LES SAVEURS DU PALAIS (2012)

HAUTE CUISINE

An exquisitely French film for the foodies, Les Saveurs Du Palais aka Haute Cuisine (which means "high cooking"), sees the writer/director of 1994’s La Séparation Christian Vincent and co-writer/producer Étienne Comar drawing upon the memoir of Daniéle Delpeuch, a self-taught chef and restauranteur who was the first woman to cook for French President Mitterrand at the Elysée Palace during the 1980s.

What results is a feature that’s light on its feet, charming and chock-full of tasty looking food and cinematic creature comforts.

Prolific French actress Catherine Frot (The Page Turner, The Dinner Game) is well cast as the hard case Hortense Laborie (the filmic alter-ego of Delpeuch) and her performance does a good job at keeping things centralized when the film occasionally feels like it is losing focus.

The character’s penchant for simplistic cuisine with a regional flavour catches the taste buds and pulls at the childhood nostalgia strings of the aging President, played by French writer/journalist and (surprisingly) non-actor Count Jean d’Ormesson who gives a kindly charismatic and dignified turn as the nameless prez who often pops in for a helpful chat now and then with Hortense – over fine wine and sliced truffle on buttered toast of course.

Structured using alternating time periods, the film opens with Laborie’s final days as head chef for a scientific expedition on a rustic sub-Antarctic base and intermittently shifts back to her tenure at the Élysee Palace four years earlier throughout. While Vincent’s attempts to meld the two settings in order to create a contrasting portrait of Hortense is welcome given her strength of character to support them, it does comes off feeling slightly awkward at times in that the frequent jumps back and forth occasionally impede on the narrative.

Nevertheless, we are provided with some catharsis as a result since one of the key plot points is Hortense’s tough as old boots demeanour being constantly tested by the near-unanimous rejection of her by the predominantly machismo staff at the Élysee and her artistic freedom becoming ever limited having to deal with a tightfisted bureaucracy and the President’s ailing health, whereas on the other side of the world she is much loved and revered, appearing to be more at ease and in her element all the while braving the elements (there’s even a bit of a Kiwi connection to be found in the closing scenes). The crux of her characterization and craft is in her culinary exploits at the Élysee however, particularly the scenes of her and young sous-chef Nicholas (Arthur Dupont) preparing the meals in lavish detail and throwing a nice touch of comedic interplay into the mix as well.

With a suitably vivacious soundtrack by Academy Award-winning composer Gabriel Yared (The English Patient, Cold Mountain, The Talented Mr. Ripley) and a smattering of sumptuous looking gastronomical delights and richly hued landscapes courtesy of French cinematographer Laurent Dailland (Place Venôme, Welcome), Haute Cuisine is an endearing and classy little food flick full of charm and an eminently likeable leading lady in Catherine Frot. When it attempts to rattle the pans (literally and figuratively) as a drama however, you’re left feeling like there should be just that little bit extra on your cinema plate to make it a wholly substantial experience. That said, if films like Babette’s Feast and Chocolat are your thing, you’ll most likely leave satisfied and no doubt a little bit peckish as well.

??? stars out of 5 (Solid)
Reviewed by Arlo Hollands

Playing in NZ cinemas from 2 May 2013

Running Time: 95 min