Director Lasse Hallström has been busy the past few years churning out YA adaptations that stir the tears and douse the fire in melodrama with Dear John and Safe Haven. The result was anything but positive. He fared better by directing the adaptation of Salmon Fishing In The Yemen, with little fanfare or popularity. Teaming up with Helen Mirren, and tackling the world of culinary arts and restaurant rivalry, Lasse Hallström’s newest film from Dreamworks is The Hundred-Foot Journey. The mere fact that Helen Mirren (State of Play, The Queen) is the lead gives high hopes to the movie, and perhaps Hallström will bring back some of his old charm we have missed seeing from his films. We could all use another Chocolat in our movie-going lives.
Director Lasse Hallström has been busy the past few years churning out YA adaptations that stir the tears and douse the fire in melodrama with Dear John and Safe Haven. The result was anything but positive. He fared better by directing the adaptation of Salmon Fishing In The Yemen, with little fanfare or popularity. Teaming up with Helen Mirren, and tackling the world of culinary arts and restaurant rivalry, Lasse Hallström’s newest film from Dreamworks is The Hundred-Foot Journey. The mere fact that Helen Mirren (State of Play, The Queen) is the lead gives high hopes to the movie, and perhaps Hallström will bring back some of his old charm we have missed seeing from his films. We could all use another Chocolat in our movie-going lives.
For now, watch the first trailer for The Hundred-Foot Journey, arriving in theatres August 8, 2014.
Synopsis:
In The Hundred-Foot Journey, Hassan Kadam (Manish Dayal) is a culinary ingénue with the gastronomic equivalent of perfect pitch. Displaced from their native India, the Kadam family, led by Papa (Om Puri), settles in the quaint village of Saint-Antonin-Noble-Val in the south of France. Filled with charm, it is both picturesque and elegant – the ideal place to settle down and open an Indian restaurant, the Maison Mumbai. That is, until the chilly chef proprietress of Le Saule Pleureur, a Michelin starred, classical French restaurant run by Madame Mallory (Academy Award®-winner Helen Mirren), gets wind of it. Her icy protests against the new Indian restaurant a hundred feet from her own escalate to all out war between the two establishments – until Hassan’s passion for French haute cuisine and for Mme. Mallory’s enchanting sous chef, Marguerite (Charlotte Le Bon), combine with his mysteriously delicious talent to weave magic between their two cultures and imbue Saint-Antonin with the flavors of life that even Mme. Mallory cannot ignore. At first Mme. Mallory’s culinary rival, she eventually recognizes Hassan’s gift as a chef and takes him under her wing.
Kathryn Schroeder, 2013, News, Trailer, Comedy, Video, 2014, The Hundred-Foot Journey, Helen Mirren, Lasse Hallström, Drama, Culinary, Dreamworks