plot, cast and review of the film |iO Donna

“THE sea ​​urchins taste like life. Life has its own flavor hidden in that shell. Raw and beautiful life. With this sentence engraved in his memory, Hassan begins his adventure. He is the protagonist of Love, cooking and curry2014 film airing tonight at 21.25 on Rai 1 and available to stream on RaiPlay. Directed by Lasse Hallström, it is based on the novel Madame Mallory and the little Indian chef by Richard C. Morais. In the cast, Helen Mirren, Manish Dayal and Om Puri.

Love, cooking and currythe plot of the movie

Hassan Kadam (Manish Dayal) comes from a family of restaurateurs. He grew up in the kitchen and owes everything he knows to his mother. Also to recognize good sea urchins and savor them down to the last bite. TO Mumbai’s political situation is tense following the election results. AND one evening someone starts a fire in the restaurant. The mother gets caught in the flames and dies.

A new life begins for Hassan and his family. They decide to move to Europemore precisely in London, but after a year they leave the English capital to seek their fortune elsewhere. The new destination is Saint-Antonin-Noble-Val, a small French village located in the South, in the Occitanie region.

Here Papa Kadam (Om Puri) opens Maison Mumbai, but it doesn’t turn out to be a happy choice. Perhaps the fault of the area: their restaurant is opposite the renowned Le Saule Pleureurowned by Madame Mallory (Helen Mirren), awarded by the Michelin Guide. Marguerite (Charlotte Le Bon) works there, a local girl who has shown herself to be very kind to the Kadams who have just arrived in the village. Hassan falls in love with her immediately.

Hassan goes to work for Madame Mallory

Madame Mallory wants to have control over the territory and declares war on Maison Mumbai. Don’t accept that his restaurant – austere, elegant, sober, mirroring the rules of French cuisine – must compete with what you think it is an inn too folkloric and low quality. At the market, no one wants to sell supplies to the Kadams. In the village there is a rumor that they are unreliable people, but despite the tripping, the wheel begins to turn in the right direction.

Soon, however, the restaurant finds itself at the center of retaliation again. Mallory calls it “the grave of good taste” and does everything to put it out of business. Boycotts, complaints and spite begin on both sides, until a fire strikes Maison Mumbai. It’s too much even for Mallory, who fires Jean-Pierre (Clément Sibony), the chef responsible for starting the fire.

Soon after, tastes an omelette cooked by Hassan, realizes he has talent and offers him a place at the Saule Pleureur. In the restaurant kitchen, has the opportunity to highlight his skills and to benefit is the restaurant itself, which gets its second Michelin star.

In the end, the discovery of the road to happiness

Hassan is not only good in the kitchen, but he also has the right intuition to innovate without distorting tradition. And he does it by inserting some spices he brought from India. His success is unstoppable and he takes a job in Paris, even if it means leaving Margueritewith whom he has since become engaged.

In the capital it is a riot. Everyone praises it, from customers to food critics. Nevertheless, after a year of triumphs, he begins to feel a growing sense of nostalgia. Against all expectations, Saint-Antonin-Noble-Val misses him and decides to return. During his absence, the Maison Mumbai and the Saule Pleureur they stopped fighting and became friends. The big news is that Papa Kadam and Madame Mallory are engaged.

That’s not all, because it finds Marguerite, with which he can start an even bigger dream. Mallory entrusts them with the Saule Pleureur with an ambitious goal: to obtain the third Michelin star.

Love, cooking and curry: a romantic comedy manifesto of integration

Love, cooking and curry is a romantic comedy, but also a manifesto of integrationwhich uses the kitchen expedient to deal with broader themes, in a light key. Helen Mirren embodies the archetypal old guardanchored to its certainties, who is afraid to open up to the new.

Papa Kadam is the stubborn man who does not accept being oustedbut, at the same time, has a hard time adapting to another culture. Hassan, on the other hand, is the sum of both. He knows that to be accepted you need to make yourself known, just as he is aware that, to fully understand France, he must study its cuisine. At the same time, try to develop his restaurant idea, mirror of its history, halfway between India and Europe. And he succeeds, also thanks to that pinch of arrogance, necessary – by his own admission – to gain respect in the kitchen.

The film – whose original title is The Hundred-Foot Journey – earned Helen Mirren her 13th Golden Globe nomination as Best Actress in a Musical or Comedy. Among the producers, appear Oprah Winfrey and Steven Spielberg.

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