ÌýTrân Anh Hùng’s "The Taste of Things" is no popcorn movie.
Concession stands are downright vulgar compared to the farmhouse kitchen at the center of Hùng’s tranquil story about food, art and passion. Set in fin-de-siècle rural France, the movie opens with a nearly wordless sequence in which the camera spends half an hour delicately dancing around Dodin, a prominent gourmet chef, and Eugénie, his celebrated cook, as they prepare an exquisite meal that will be received by an appreciative company of epicureans.
"The Taste of Things," which screens Friday for a third and final time at the Milwaukee Film Festival (4:30 p.m., Downer Theatre), spurns the whip pans of, say, Hulu’s "The Bear," choosing to instead extract its ingredients from slow, enchanting gastroclassics like "Babette’s Feast" and "Big Night." Marked by sensuous colors, natural lighting and rigorous period costumes, the movie’s autumnal production design reflects the way Dodin and Eugénie are meticulous about their process of making elaborate dishes; for them, cooking is an art form, but it’s also their main language.
When words fail, they speak through food.
There’s something deeply endearing about the way Dodin and Eugénie simultaneously treat recipes, and each other, with reverence. In one vulnerable scene, Dodin scrupulously tailors a table to Eugénie’s palette. The meal is his love letter, of course, which is why he nervously waits for her response. But "The Taste of Things" is more about the constitutional connection — the mind meld — between people than simple romance. It knows that relationships can be an art form, too.
Eventually the movie transforms its menu, throwing salt at the viewer in ways that ought not be spoiled. That these turns feel entirely earned owes a great deal to the leads, Benoît Magimel and Juliette Binoche. Formerly a real-life power couple, the middle-aged French legends deliver mature, sophisticated performances that seem at ease with the complicated contours of life.
The final passage of "The Taste of Things" presents not one but two perfect closing shots, including a doubled 360degree pan that breathtakingly coalesces Hùng’s ideas about what it means to be in harmony, to give and grieve, and to find renewal. Like the gorgeous Vietnamese summer opening to Hùng’s "The Vertical Ray of the Sun" — one of my favorite moments in all of cinema — it achieves a rare ambrosial effect.
Baked into the Milwaukee Film Festival is FOMO — for example, foodies who missed the sole screening of "Menus-Plaisirs Les Troisgros," Frederick Wiseman’s four-hour documentary about a lauded French restaurant, will have to settle for streaming it via PBS — but fortunately the fest’s final week offers extra helpings of many key attractions.
(Eric Beltmann teaches film and literature in West Bend. He has written about cinema for print and web outlets since 1991.)