There are these periods in which movies about the same subject are being released. That almost automatically means that you will start comparing the two and that one of them is worse. Examples are A Bug’s Life and Antz, The Prestige and The Illusionist and when it comes to movies about cooking there was Chef and not too long after that Burnt. And as I thought Chef was fantastic I wasn’t in a hurry to watch this movie starring Bradley Cooper, because I had the feeling it wouldn’t be as good. Still I was a bit curious about it and as it has been out on DVD for a while I decided to watch it.
Except for the fact that both Chef are about chefs, they are difficult to compare. Chef is a wonderful feel-good film in which it is all about simple, but delicious looking food and family ties. The setup of Burnt is different. Adam Jones (Cooper) is a bad boy chef who has burnt a lot of bridges in his past because of his behaviour and use of drugs. While in France he literally destroyed careers. He decided to get away from all of it in America and only return after cleaning a million oysters in a no name restaurant. He achieves that goal and now has set his sights on achieving a three star Michelin rating. He decides to head to London to meet up with some people from the past and realise his dream. But is that possible with his past?
With an interesting cast, besides Cooper there is Omar Sy, Sienna Miller, Daniel Brühl, Emma Thompson, Alicia Vikander and Uma Thurman in both big and small parts, it is a movie that has potential. Not a lot of bad things can be said about the acting, but the story itself is where this movie is lacking. As you can expect with a story like this it has the necessary drama, but as a viewer it is hard to feel a connection to someone who has treated others like dirt in the past. The fact that he has cleaned oysters as some sort of redemption can’t make up for that. Unfortunately the movie doesn’t manage to surprise and has a lot of clichés, including an unnecessary love story which is anything but convincing. I wouldn’t go as far to call Burnt a bad film, but if I have to choose between Chef and Burnt I’d rather pick the fresh one, not the one with a title already indicating it might be overcooked.
Pretty much felt the same toward these two films.
Felt the same about Burnt. It was an okay film. And it was hard not to get the image out of my head that Bradley Cooper was just playing Anthony Bourdain… again. But hey, it was a decent enough way to pass a couple of hours.
I’m pretty much with you on this one. It actually has some interesting things going for it but it absolutely fizzles in other areas.