Out of Africa

Based on the life of Karen Blixen (whose nom de plume was Isak Dinesen), Out of Africa features surprisingly little in the way of indigenous food. Or maybe it’s not surprising: after all, the Blixens and their English counterparts intended to “civilize” the colony of Kenya. Most of the dishes in the film seem to have been brought directly from the colonizers’ home countries, even if actually cultivated or produced in Africa: potatoes, green beans, peas, cheese, bread. The wine and champagne are unquestionably from Europe. The fish that Blixen (Streep) serves Finch Hatton (Redford) and Cole (Kitchen) certainly comes from the river that she has had dammed up to make a pond on her farm, but the only other local flavor depicted is the meat that Finch Hatton shoots for dinner while he and Blixen are “on safari”--although never stated, it’s probably water buffalo.

Released 1985
Directed by Sydney Pollack
Screenplay by Kurt Luedtke, based on books by Karen Blixen (Out of Africa, Shadows on the Grass, and Letters from Africa as Isak Dinesen), Judith Thurman (Isak Dinesen: The Life of a Storyteller), and Errol Trzebinski (Silence Will Speak)

Starring Meryl Streep as Karen Blixen, Robert Redford as Denys Finch Hatton, Klaus Maria Brandauer as Bror Blixen, Michael Kitchen as Berkeley Cole, Malick Bowens as Farah, Joseph Thiaka as Kamante, Stephen Kinyanjui as Kinanjui, Michael Gough as Lord Delamere, Suzanna Hamilton as Felicity, Rachel Kempson as Lady Belfield, Graham Crowden as Lord Belfield, Leslie Phillips as Sir Joseph, Shane Rimmer as Belknap, Mike Bugara as Juma, Job Seda as Kanuthia, and Mohammed Umar as Ismail

Awards: 1986 Academy Awards for Best Art Direction-Set Decoration, Best Cinematography, Best Director, Best Music-Original Score (John Barry), Best Picture, Best Sound, and Best Writing-Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium; 1987 BAFTA Film Awards for Best Cinematography, Best Screenplay-Adapted, and Best Sound; 1987 BMI Film & TV Music Award; 1986 British Society of Cinematographers Best Cinematography Award; 1986 David di Donatello Awards for Best Foreign Actress (Streep) and Best Foreign Film; 1986 Golden Globe Awards for Best Motion Picture-Drama, Best Original Score-Motion Picture, and Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture (Brandauer); 1987 Guild of German Art House Cinemas Gold Award for Foreign Film; 1986 KCFCC Awards for Best Actress (Streep) and Best Supporting Actor (Brandauer); 1987 LCC Film Special Achievement Award for John Barry; 1985 LAFCA Awards for Best Actress (Streep) and Best Cinematography; 1985 NBR Award for Best Supporting Actor (Brandauer); 1985 NYFCC Awards for Best Cinematographer and Best Supporting Actor (Brandauer)

Oklahoma!

Gertie: I peaked in your basket up at the house. I see you got gooseberry tarts, too. I wonder if they’s as light as mine. Mine’d like to float away if you blew on them.
Laurey: I just did blow on one of mine, and it broke into a million pieces!
Gertie: Ain’t she funny?
---
Aunt Eller: $50? Nobody ever bid $50 for a lunch. Nobody ever bid ten.
---
Andrew: What are you getting for your $51?
Ali: A three-day bellyache.

Although the movie’s action builds toward a “box social,” where picnic baskets are auctioned off in order to raise money for the new schoolhouse, the characters in Oklahoma! merely talk about what’s in those wonderful lunch baskets: cold duck with stuffing, lemon meringue pie, custard with raspberry syrup, mince pie, sweet potato pie, and, of course, wonderfully light gooseberry tarts. At the party, Andrew (Whitmore) convinces Ali (Albert) to bid $51 to win Ado Annie’s (Grahame) basket, but that means Will (Nelson) is left with enough cash to convince her father to let him be the groom. But the picnic lunch that Laurey (Jones) prepared brings in the top amount, $53 , as Curly (MacRae) and Jud (Steiger) vie for her favors. Even at today’s prices, that’s a lot of money for a lunch basket, but in Oklahoma Territory in the early 1900s, it represented a cowboy’s total worth, the value of Curly’s saddle, his horse, and his gun! He must really have liked gooseberry tarts.

Released 1955
Directed by Fred Zinnemann
Music by Richard Rodgers
Book and lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II
Screenplay by Sonya Levien and William Ludwig
Based on the play Green Grow the Lilacs by Lynn Riggs
Dances staged by Agnes de Mille

Starring Gordon MacRae as Curly McLain, Shirley Jones as Laurey Williams, Eddie Albert as Ali Hakim, Gloria Grahame as Ado Annie Carnes, Gene Nelson as Will Parker, Charlotte Greenwood as Aunt Eller Murphy, James Whitmore as Andrew Carnes, and Rod Steiger as Jud Fry

Awards: 1956 Academy Awards for Best Music, Scoring of a Musical Picture, and Best Sound, Recording

Moonstruck

Ronny: What’s that smell?
Loretta: I’m making you a steak.
Ronny: I don’t want it.
Loretta: You’ll eat it.
Ronny: I like it well done.
Loretta: You’ll eat this one bloody, it’ll feed your blood.

Rose: Old man, you give those dogs another piece of my food, I’m gonna kick you till you’re dead.

Johnny: There’s been a miracle.
Rose: A miracle. Well, that’s news.
Johnny: My mother’s recovered.
Rose: You’re kidding.
Johnny: Oh, no. The breath had almost totally left her body. She was as white as snow. And then, she completely pulled back from death. And stood up. And put on her clothes. And began to cook for everyone in the house—the mourners, and me, and herself—she ate a meal that could choke a pig.
Rose: That’s incredible.

Films about Italian American families always feature family conflicts, “operatic” drama, and good food, and Moonstruck follows this formula to award-winning success. Loretta (Cher) lives with her parents in their Brooklyn townhouse, working as a bookkeeper and waiting for her boyfriend, Johnny (Aiello), to propose matrimony. He finally does, and she accepts, though for her it will be a marriage of safety, not love. When Johnny flies to Sicily to be at his mother’s deathbed, he asks Loretta to go see his estranged brother, Ronny (Cage), who bakes bread in the family bakery. She complies, finding that Ronny is so much more than she ever expected—and everything she wants in a man.
Over the course of the film, the viewer vicariously experiences some very hearty Brooklyn Italian dishes: steak and spaghetti, ravioli, sausage and peppers, green salad, minestrone. A viewer’s favorite is the champagne, sweetened with a cube of sugar to make it fizz. What is shown most appealingly, however, is the breakfast, prepared as follows : slice Italian bread, make a hole in the center of each slice, then place them in a frying pan with melted butter; place an egg in the hole of each and fry until the egg is cooked to taste; serve with fried red peppers on top—not to mention with a side order of Italian-style family love.

Released 1987
Directed by Norman Jewison
Written by John Patrick Shanley
Starring Cher as Loretta Castorini, Nicholas Cage as Ronny Cammareri, Vincent Gardenia as Cosmo Castorini, Olympia Dukakis as Rose Castorini, Danny Aiello as Johnny Cammareri, Julie Bovasso as Rita Cappomaggi, Louis Guss as Raymond Cappomaggi, John Mahoney as Perry, Feodor Chaliapin Jr. as Old Man, and Anita Gillette as Mona
Awards: 1989 ASCAP Film and Television Music Awards for Top Box Office Film; 1988 Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Cher), Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Dukakis), and Best Writing, Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen; 1988 American Comedy Award for Funniest Supporting Female Performer-Motion Picture or TV (Dukakis); 1989 BAFTA Film Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Dukakis); 1988 Berlin International Film Festival Silver Berlin Bear for Best Director; 1988 Casting Society of America Artios for Best Casting for Feature Film, Comedy; 1988 David di Donatello Award for Best Foreign Actress (Cher); 1988 Golden Globe for Best Performance by an Actress in a Motion Picture-Comedy/Musical (Cher) and Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role in a Motion Picture (Dukakis); 1988 Italian National Syndicate of Film Journalists Silver Ribbon for Best Actress-Foreign Film (Cher); 1988 Kansas City Film Critics Circle Awards for Best Actress (Cher), Best Film, and Best Supporting Actress (Dukakis); Los Angeles Film Critics Association Award for Best Supporting Actress (Dukakis); 1987 National Board of Review Award for Best Supporting Actress (Dukakis); and 1988 Writers Guild of America Award for Best Screenplay Written Directly for the Screen

Mildred Pierce

Wally: What’s this? (as Mildred wraps an apron around his waist)
Mildred: Wally, we’re swamped. You’ve got to help us.
Wally: Who, me? I’m an executive.
Mildred: Well, you’re now vice president in charge of the potatoes.

Opening with the depiction of a murder, this “whodunit” with a surprise ending not only ended Crawford’s career slump but earned her a Best Actress Oscar. Driven to provide the very best for her daughter Veda (Blyth), Mildred (Crawford) has spent her entire married life in the kitchen, not only putting fine meals on the table but also baking cakes and pies to order for parties and other celebrations. When she catches her husband in an affair and asks him to leave, she must find additional employment and ends up as a waitress at a diner. There she learns the restaurant business, the hard way, and despite Veda’s expensive tastes manages to save enough to invest in her own establishment: Mildred’s Fine Foods, a restaurant with an elegant dining area, a handsome bar, and a drive-in service. She has such success that she is able to open five restaurants in three years. Unfortunately, all the men in her life, as Ida (Arden), remarks, “have the instincts of a heel,” and their selfishness leads to tragedy.


Although it centers on the restaurant business, Mildred Pierce doesn’t actually show much in the way of food. The viewer has fleeting glimpses of chicken dinners and sandwiches at the diner, and of the very large, ornate birthday cake and the dozens of peach, berry, pumpkin, cherry, and apple pies that Mildred bakes. What is perhaps more interesting is the contemporary restaurant slang that would be unfamiliar to most of today’s viewers: for example, “Adam and Eve on a raft, make it hard!” is an order for two hard-boiled eggs on toast. One might speculate that the actors, screenwriters, directors, and others involved in the movie brought their own experience to bear during the restaurant scenes, given that so many film people have spent so much time as wait staff at so many eating establishments before finding their true métier.


Fun Fact:
As has many an actor before and since, Joan Crawford supported herself as a salesperson and waitress before making it in film, and her own experiences added verité to her award-winning performance as rags-to-riches restaurateur Mildred Pierce.

Released 1945
Directed by Michael Curtiz
Screenplay by Ranald MacDougall, based on the novel of the same name by James M. Cain

Starring Joan Crawford as Mildred Pierce Beragon, Jack Carson as Wally Fay, Zachary Scott as Monte Beragon, Eve Arden as Ida Corwin, Ann Blyth as Veda Pierce Forrester, Bruce Bennett as Albert “Bert” Pierce, and Butterfly McQueen as Lottie

Awards: 1946 Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role (Crawford); 1945 National Board of Review Award for Best Actress (Crawford)

Last Holiday

A remake of the 1950 film Last Holiday starring Alec Guinness as George Bird, 2006’s Last Holiday, starring Queen Latifah in the starring role of Georgia Bird, features some amazingly beautiful and mouth-watering dishes, from simple-to-prepare dishes like shrimp cocktail to a more complicated cassoulet. Even the names are delicious: Poulet Tchoupitoulas, Creole Roasted Duck Hash en Croute, Rissotto Barolo with Truffles, Rouget Citrus Beurre Blanc with Capers, Roast Quail with Brioche Stuffing, and Braised Lamb Shank with Blood Orange Relish, not to mention an amazing Crawfish Gumbo chez Georgia’s Joint and the Hotel Papp’s Stuffed Boiled Fish and an incredible bouillabaisse.

The film also includes some of the best food lines ever written:

--“The poor baby turnips. Nobody likes them, you know? Of course, life is easy if you are a truffle or a shiitake mushroom. But the turnip is to be loved because she’s a self-made woman of vegetables. All the others you can only destroy with cooking. But the turnip, she gets better. So, you see, it’s not how you start but how you finish.”

--“No butter, no cream, no wheat, no dairy, no fat! Eh, merde! Why do they bother to eat?”

--“The secret of life is butter!”

Food, of course, is a metaphor for how to live: if you want to taste life in full, don’t ask the “chef” to make any “substitutions” in the way he or she prepares your meal. As Georgia remarks, “You wait and you wait for something big to happen…and then you find out you’re gonna die.” So, turn your “Book of Possibilities” into a “Book of Realities,” pursue your dreams now, and live without regrets. It’s a common message in Hollywood films, but Last Holiday gives it a very tasty twist.

Fun Fact:

Food Network chefs traveled with the film crew and prepared all the dishes served in the movie. From them, Queen Latifah learned a number of cooking techniques so that she would be convincing as a professional chef. On their website, the Food Network also posted recipes for some of the dishes that appeared in the movie, such as Lobster Salad in Potato Leek Nests and Bananas Foster.

Released January 13, 2006
Directed by Wayne Wang
Written by Jeffrey Price and Peter S. Seaman

Starring Queen Latifah as Georgia Byrd, LL Cool J as Sean Matthews, Timothy Hutton as Matthew Kragen, Gerard Dépardieu as Chef Didier, Giancarlo Esposito as Senator Dillings, Alicia Witt as Ms. Burns, Susan Kellermann as Gunther, Matt Ross as Adamian, and Ranjit Chowdhry as Dr. Gupta; cameo by Emeril Lagasse as himself

Lady and the Tramp

Joe: Here's your bones, Tony.
Tony: Okay, bones. Bones? What's the matter with you, Joe? I break-a your face! Tonight, Butch, he gets the best in the house!
Joe: Okay, Tony! You the boss.
Tony: [Showing Tramp the menu] Now, tell me, what's your pleasure? A la carte? Dinner? [Tramp barks something like "Spaghetti"]
Tony: A-ha, okay. Hey, Joe! Butch-a, he says he wants-a two spaghetti speciale. Heavy on the meats-a ball.
Joe: Tony, dogs don't talk.
Tony: He's a-talkin' to me!
Joe: Okay, he's a-talkin' to you! You the boss! Mamma mia.

A tale of romance between a society cocker spaniel and a street dog, Lady and the Tramp has endeared viewers for half a century. While the story's setting may seem quaint and the plot outdated, the film has an enduring charm and features a collection of songs that have become standards, including "He's a Tramp" and "Bella Notte." Indeed, Peggy Lee's rendition of "He's a Tramp" is often emulated but never equaled.

The movie also features a memorable dinner scene: For their first "date," Tramp takes Lady to Tonys Restaurant, where he is known as Butch. Because he is one of Tony's favorite "customers," Tramp is allowed to treat Lady to a dinner of spaghetti and meatballs. As Tony and Joe serenade the couple, Tramp and Lady begin eating the same strand of spaghetti, slurping it up until they both reach the middle and unexpectedly kiss. Lady turns away shyly, but Tramp nuzzles the last meatball over to her side of the plate. Once again, food serves romance.

Released June 22, 1955
Written by Ward Greene, Erdman Penner, Joe Rinaldi, Ralph Wright, Don DaGradi, and Joe Grant
Directed by Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, and Hamilton Luske

Starring Peggy Lee as Darling/Si/Am/Peg, Barbara Luddy as Lady, Larry Roberts as Tramp, Bill Thompson as Jock/Dachsie/Joe, Bill Baucom as Trusty, George Givot as Tony, Lee Millar as Jim Dear, Verna Felton as Aunt Sarah, Alan Reed as Boris

Songs: "He's a Tramp" by Sonny Burke and Peggy Lee, performed by Peggy Lee; "The Siamese Cat Song" by Sonny Burke and Peggy Lee, performed by Peggy Lee; "Bella Notte (This Is the Night)" by Sonny Burke and Peggy Lee, performed by George Givot and studio chorus

Awards: 1956 David di Donatello Award for Best Foreign Production

Julie & Julia

Julia: French people eat French food. Every single day. I can’t get over it.

Julie: …is there anything better than butter? Think it over: Every time you taste something that’s delicious beyond imagining and you say, “What is in this?”, the answer is always going to be, Butter. … Here’s my final word on the subject: You can never have too much butter.

Based on two books (Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen by Julie Powell and My Life in France by Julia Child and Alex Prud’homme) and Julie Powell’s blog, Julie & Julia relates two stories: that of Julia Child (Streep) and how she came to learn French cooking; and that of Julie Powell (Adams) and how she came to cook all of the recipes in the classic Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Child, Louisette Berthollle, and Simone Beck.

Of course, the film is filled with amazing food. One of the first enticements—appealing to the viewer’s sweet tooth—is chocolate pie; but many delectables follow: bruschetta; artichokes with hollandaise sauce; chicken with cream, mushrooms, and port; soufflés; lobster thermidor; braised cucumbers; roast chicken stuffed with chicken livers and cream cheese; the famous boeuf bourguignon; raspberry Bavarian cream; and finally, boned duck, stuffed and baked in a pastry shell.

Although novices might disagree, much of cooking has a particular certainty to it. As Julie comments, “You know what I love about cooking? … I love that after a day when nothing is sure—and when I say ‘nothing’ I mean nothing!—you can come home and absolutely know that if you add eggs yolks to chocolate and sugar and milk, it will get thick. It’s such a comfort.” Or as Julia Child often said, “Don’t be afraid!” Excellent advice for cooks and chefs of whatever level of experience.

Released 2009
Written and directed by Nora Ephron

Starring Meryl Streep as Julia Child, Amy Adams as Julie Powell, Stanley Tucci as Paul Child, Chris Messina as Eric Powell, Linda Emond as Simone Beck, and Helen Carey as Louisette Bertholle

Awards: 2009 BSFC Award for Best Actress (Streep); 2009 NYFCC Award for Best Actress (Streep); 2009 SEFCA Award for Best Actress (Streep)