07 Apr The Taste of Things – AF French Film Festival 2024
The advice I got at the launch of the French Film Festival this year was to see ‘The Taste of Things’ with an appetite. It was for this reason that I chose the 3:40 pm session. So that we could enjoy dinner afterwards.
The film itself was a sensory work of art. The gentle, slow plot centred around cooking in a French country kitchen. These scenes of preparing elaborate meals were the main substance of the film. It was certainly surprising to encounter 35 minutes of sifting, chopping, sauteing, clarifying, baking and other culinary practices in the first part of the film.
Also, the love story that wove between the different culinary offerings was very touching. It felt as though it was very much an embodied love affair of the flesh.
We found quite a bit to laugh about in this film, but it was very much a slow burn. Quite a few people walked out in the middle of it. There are also some scenes involving the sometimes quite subjectively gross process of preparing meat products for a feast.
The gardens around the country manor where the action took place were exquisite. Sometimes the actors would wade through a sea of flowers reminiscent of something from the Italian countryside in A Room With a View. My friend thought that it may have been filmed in Monet’s garden.
It left me with such an evocative sense of traditional French cuisine. It was also so inspiring in terms of the skill of talented cooks. And I got a deeply touching sense of the kind of love that can be touched, seen and tasted.
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