My Review of "The Menu"

The Menu is a dark comedy thriller that came out late in 2022. The whole movie is a bit of a mystery and the trailers for this movie helped build the intrigue. They don't tell you much and that's how it's supposed to be. That's why my anticipation was up for this one. I hope this is the start of a new trend.

The movie starts out with the introduction of a few characters. Most notably we have Margot and Tyler at the forefront. It seems as though they're a brand new couple on a little bit of a date night. What a hell of a date night this will turn out to be...

Tyler works well in introducing us to this world of foodies. He introduces us to some of the other minor characters involved in this special dining experience. He's a huge food enthusiast himself, though his enthusiasm edges towards obsession. I guess Margot is basically the movie viewers eyes and ears while Tyler is the eyes and ears of the people vested into the foodie culture.

The duo are going to a remote island to experience one of the worlds most premier chef's dining experience of a lifetime. We have an older rich couple, a media superstar, food critics and rich investors on board. They're all in this out of different motivations. Throughout the movie more of their mystery unravels and the connections each of them have.

Innocently enough, the movie starts off quite pleasant. We get a ton of glorious looking dishes. The head chef is there to narrate the intricacies and why each of the dishes are so beautiful. Everything has a story and the whole experience starts to come off as a bit pretentious. It's something you kind of expect form one of these deconstruction food places you hear about.

As the movie goes on you start to realize things aren't so clear cut. Things get a lot more extreme and weird. The chef starts to get a lot more personal and the clientele starts to get uncomfortable. I guess with art you have to get uncomfortable right? Well hopefully never like this... Each of these dishes get more and more extravagant but with a crazier and crazier story.

We start to realize what the real motivation is behind everything and luckily we have Margot as our eyes and ears. She's the relatable character that prevents the movie from going outright bonkers. Well it does go a bit bonkers but we can see what a rational person would do in that moment.

This movie isn't for everyone. Dark comedies are an acquired taste and I have kind of grown to like some of them. This was one of them. Some of the extreme situations are so dark but you have to laugh at them because of the absurdity. They play on words and situations as if a very chaotic comedian was writing it. I was probably the one one in the theatre laughing at some of the situations.

That's part of the fun though. I think everyone will interpret this movie differently. For the most part it is about art. The chef is an artist. He meticulously arranges everything for that evening. This includes the story the ingredients and the arrangements of seating. Everything is methodical and purposeful and that's not something you can do randomly.

They talk about the artist, their motivations as an artist and especially their audience. A lot of artists will watch this movie and interpret it differently. Though if you're an artist, I'm hard-pressed to think you will not get any enjoyment watching this movie.

Overall, if you can't already tell, I loved this movie. I thought it was entertaining from start to finish. You can tell that they had done a ton of planning and editing to get this movie right. A lot of special care was taken in all the details of this movie. Pacing was right on point for me but I can see how certain audiences might not get into it. For me I will have to give this one an 8 out of 10. It is definitely a movie that I would be going back to and recommending to my friends.