Review by Clay N Ferno

Produced by Jon Favreau, Karen Gilchrist, Sergei Bespalov

Written and Directed by Jon Favreau

Starring Jon Favreau, Sofía Vergara, John Leguizamo,

Scarlett Johansson, Oliver Platt, Bobby Cannavale,

Dustin Hoffman, Robert Downey, Jr.

Triple threat Jon Favreau (Swingers, Iron Man) writes, directs and stars in this delightful family friendly comedy about a chef that redefines himself through his cooking, and his relationship to his son after being torn apart by a popular food blogger.

Guest starring half of the cast of Iron Man 2 (Scarlett Johansson, Robert Downey, Jr.), plus other on-screen heavyweights John Leguizamo, Dustin Hoffman and Oliver Platt, Chef is a story about how people touch other people’s hearts with their food.

When food blogger Ramsey Michel (Oliver Platt) descends on Chef Carl Casper’s (Jon Favreau) restaurant, he’s expecting to be wowed like he was in Miami years ago when he saw the young chef in his element.

Now the years have gone by, Carl’s still a great chef with innovative ideas but is held back by ‘playing the hits’ at Riva’s (Hoffman) restaurant.

The food isn’t all that’s changed. Carl has a young son Percy (young talent Emjay Anthony) with his ex-wife Inez, the gorgeous Sofía Vergara. Carl keeps Percy at arms-length as he struggles to keep his kitchen together and his pride, working for Riva at the expense of his creativity.

Riva’s hostess Molly (Johansson) and Carl spend time smoking behind the bar, as kitchen workers do, and hint at a flirty romance that you spend the whole movie wondering what will happen between the two. Chef parlays this into him simply making her a pesto instead of taking it further at one key scene in the movie before movie takes a shot at a redemption story.

Ramsey Michel reviews the Chef’s menu, calling it pedantic and unimaginative. Carl was forced to serve the highlights of the menu and not exercise his creative bones. What happens is a poor review and then a series of events over social media that make the rivalry go viral.

In a touching (and mouth-watering) grilled-cheese scene, son Percy explains twitter to his Dad with his iPad after the review is posted. After Percy has gone to bed, and Chef trolled his feed, he sends an incendiary public message to Ramsey, thinking it was a direct message. In the morning, @ChefCarlCasper has thousands of followers and is now a trending topic!

This leads to a rivalry that drives the rest of the film. As an aside, this is the best implementation I have seen in any film or TV show of not only explaining social media but also illustrating ‘live tweets’. It could be the special effects team, or just clever storytelling, but well played, Jon!

A second meal is planned for Ramsey but he is once again shackled to the strict menu by Riva, so he is asked to leave or stay and cook the hits. Tony (Bobby Cannavale) is promoted to head chef as Carl leaves.

Ramsey’s meal is more of the same, so he calls him out on Twitter once again, and a true confrontation is caught on tape as Carl Casper has a meltdown in front of a full restaurant and worse yet – cameras capturing this all for YouTube.

Again, great use of social media outlets as characters in the film.

Down on his luck, Chef travels with Percy and Inez to Miami to meet up with Inez’ ex, Marvin (Robert Downey, Jr.) for a helping hand. Marvin donates a taco truck and Chef and Percy start renovations before Martin (Leguizamo) joins them for a cross country trip selling Cuban sandwiches from the truck.

Percy and his Dad get to spend time together, working hard and teaching one another, as they both desire. The poor social media attention from the Ramsey review helps market the food truck as they make their way back to the West Coast together.

Delightful stops in New Orleans and Austin, TX incorporate local food staples into the sandwiches and fund the trip back home. Guys on a road-trip jokes are plenty, but what tops it is the corn starch scene.

This movie has a great script, great actors and it was great fun for me. For someone steeped in action and superhero films, I’m reminded not only where these actors come from, but what they are great at.

Chef is a great family story without being too mushy, mixed with a great soundtrack from Hot 8 Brass Band, Rebirth Brass Band and practically a full set of music from Gary Clark Jr.. For the Cuban music, none other than the legendary ‘Perico’ Jose Caridad Hernández has plenty of screen time as Percy’s granddad (abuelito) and also singer for ‘Oye Como Va’, and ‘La Quimbumba’.

Insert food related short review here …”Chef is Caliente!”, or “Favreau Delivers with Chef”.

Sorry, had to be done!