Dinner. Sex. Murder. Dessert. Stabbing. Abuse. Singing. Rape. Cannibalism. Cooking. This is the world of Peter Greenaway’s graphic, rhythmic and haunting film starring Helen Mirren and Michael Gambon.
Albert Spica (future Dumbledore Michael Gambon) returns each night to the same restaurant with his unflappable wife, Georgina (Helen Mirren), and his gang of thugs. He boisterously announces every thought in his head, punctuated by profanity and verbal abuse of everyone around him. Meanwhile, his wife begins an affair with the bookish Michael sitting at a nearby table.
The cook, French chef Richard Borst, is the arbiter of Georgina and Michael’s affair, hiding them in pantries and meat lockers to protect them from her gangster husband. He and his eclectic staff of cooks, dishwashers and servers suffer the brunt of Albert’s verbal abuse, but soon witness the escalating violence that this so-called marriage has brought down on them.
It’s difficult to say which is more unearthly or evocative: the set design or Michael Nyman’s orchestral score. The restaurant, kitchen and loading dock are where 90% of the film takes place, and the vaulted ceilings, broad corridors and colourful lights are like sets out of “Blade Runner” or “Brazil”. At the same time, the music is as epic and overbearing for a climactic fight as it is for the serving of desert.
Extreme elements, from the words and actions of the villain to the alienating score and sweeping movement of the camera, boil over and drown the audience in ways that few films dare to do. The emotional impact of this film could be compared to “Requiem for a Dream” or “A Clockwork Orange”. Extreme adult content in a powerful narrative can leave the right audience stunned and fascinated.
It is likely the film’s X rating that kept it from gaining wider acclaim in the way that Stanley Kubrick’s film have (and this is a very Kubrickian film), and the same can be written for Michael Gambon’s character. Albert Spica may have missed out on the AFI’s Top Villains list, but when he makes appearances on similar lists, he’s at the top.
As published on Examiner.com
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