Mexican writer-director Alonso Ruizpalacios, best known for his acclaimed hybrid documentary-thriller A Cop Movie, taps into current audience appetites for frazzled, behind-the-scenes restaurant kitchen dramas with his latest picture. Like The Menu and TV series The Bear, this stylish but exhausting film serves up more than just an insight into an intense working environment.
La Cocina, loosely based on Arnold Wesker’s 1957 play The Kitchen, is kinetically shot in striking black and white and unfolds over a stressful day in the kitchen of a busy Times Square tourist trap. It’s about the undocumented migrant experience and the illusive nature of dreams, American and otherwise. Central to the drama is a missing $800 and the strained romance between hot-headed Mexican chef Pedro (Raúl Briones) and American waitress Julia (Rooney Mara).
Parts of it are excellent: there’s a propulsive, unpredictable energy to the kitchen during the midday rush; the direction, and the agile choreography of cast and camera, are breathtaking. But the exaggerated staginess and histrionic screeching start to grate long before this overstuffed meal is finished.
In UK and Irish cinemas
