Chef (the 2012 film)

I rarely make comments on films from countries other than the United States or Ecuador because not many of those are brought to be offered to the Guayaquilean audience. And also I  must confess I don´t know much about other countries' film industry so as to venture an opinion.
But Le Chef is different. This 2012 French comedy is truly worth your time. With Jean Reno (Alexander Lagarde) in one of the two leading roles and Michael Youn (Jacky Bonnot) in the other.Lagarde is a famous chef who works for a company whose new CEO is unkind to him is looking for a good excuse to replace him. Lagarde feels intimidated and is anxious because soon important critics will visit his restaurant and if there is nothing extraordinary to impress them he will lose his job. Jacky is a talented but hard luck chef who is obsessed with cuisine and is a perfectionist to the point of exasperation which has caused him to lose one job after another regardless of his obvious talent. In  order to sabotage Lagarde´s labor the new CEO relocates Lagarde´s assistants in other restaurants of his company so Lagarde gets desperate as he is in dire  need of a new assistant and incidentally meets Jacky who impresses him with his love for good cuisine and his admiration of Lagarde himself. Both Lagarde and Jacky have problems in his private lives that interfere with their jobs; Lagarde for example has a grownup daughter who needs her father's attention and Jacky is married to a beautiful woman who wouldn´t forgive her husband to lie to her even more so now that she is expecting.
All these conditions will lead to  eighty-six minutes of an entertaining film that keeps the audience focused and  expectant to the following crazy development in the lives of these two temperamental chefs and their complicate lives. Jean Reno shows is Thespian skills proving that his he can easily get rid of the "tough guy" image that Hollywood insists in seeing in him; and Youn delivers a marvelous performance as well. The photography (specially that last scene with the Eiffel tower in the back) is pretty good and so is the music. The strong points of this film are the actors and the story that makes this comedy one for the whole family to enjoy with no unnecessary violence, unwanted sex scenes or stupid jokes.
Five stars out of five for this one.

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