Not for the first time in his career, director John Wells sits at the intersection of the formulaic and the experienced. There’s little about his latest film, the restaurant-set Burnt, that doesn’t echo other chef fare, mine similar tales of middle-aged men finally finding their maturity, or send a flawed protagonist down a well-trodden path of redemption and resolution. And yet, as he did in The Company Men and August: Osage County, he corrals familiar components with competence.
Of course, crafting a movie that’s proficiently made from stylish shots of kitchen interiors and gourmet food plates is different from offering up a wholly satisfying slice of cinematic entertainment, and the chasm between the two is evident as Wells’ effort charts the attempted return to culinary glory of Adam Jones (Bradley Cooper, Aloha). The bulk of the content the feature presents is polished and palatable, but there’s no mistaking that this is a dish served plenty of times previously, and lacking the spice that justifies another helping; a regular meal made with a few quality ingredients remains just that in filmic form.
Jones is both Burnt‘s focal point and one of the reasons that it lacks something special. He’s the archetypal troubled male in a seen-before scenario, here placed in the guise of a former kitchen star that started from nothing, rose to the top of the Parisian gastronomy scene, and then engineered his own drink, sex and drug-fuelled demise. After living in self-imposed purgatory shucking oysters in New Orleans, he heads to London to take over the eatery run by his one-time colleague Tony (Daniel Brühl, Woman in Gold), though he’ll have to use his charm and bravado to convince his estranged pal to give him the job. Determined to best his friend turned successful rival Reece (Matthew Rhys, TV’s The Americans), he enlists former co-workers Michel (Omar Sy, Jurassic World) and Max (Riccardo Scamarcio, Pasolini) to assist, as well as scouting saucier and single mother Helene (Sienna Miller, Foxcatcher) to join the team.
That Burnt once went by the plain moniker of its main character’s name is emblematic of how myopic it is in scope, and how boilerplate the narrative it immerses Jones in also proves. Though screenwriter Steven Knight demonstrated just how effectively one man’s dramas can anchor a film in Locke, here, in working with a story by Iron Sky‘s Michael Kalesniko, he’s happy playing in ego-driven, romance-littered by-the-numbers territory; think a darker, less crowd-pleasing spin on his screenplay for fellow cooking-themed fare The Hundred-Foot Journey. Accordingly, little stands out about the central figure other than his arrogance and determination, with a bland lead immersed in standard circumstances hardly proving appetising, let alone interesting. Thankfully, the feature’s technical credits — the glossy sheen of the Adriano Goldman (Trash)-shot visuals, and the jaunty pace of Nick Moore’s (She’s Funny That Way) frenetic editing — help the movie look the tempting, upbeat part, even if it doesn’t taste like it.
Performance-wise, an extended cast that also includes Emma Thompson (A Walk in the Woods), Uma Thurman (The Slap), Alicia Vikander (The Man from U.N.C.L.E.) and Lily James (Cinderella) in thankless roles, similarly find themselves trapped between Wells’ workmanlike approach and the template nature of the material. That the bulk of players acquit themselves well speaks to their talents more than the scantly written parts they’re given; however the re-teaming of American Sniper‘s Cooper and Miller remains problematic. Just as their love story fits the movie’s mould, so does their lukewarm chemistry and routine portrayals, his energy unable to hide the absent complexity the film’s barked-out dialogue implores audiences to believe exists, and her seesawing from supportive to ambitious always feeling flavourless. In their efforts, as in much of the movie, the difference between mixing the right elements together and cooking up something that’s better than average is stark and ever noticeable.
Rating: 2 ½ stars out of 5
Burnt
Director: John Wells
USA, 2015, 109 mins
Release date: 22 October
Distributor: Roadshow
Rated: M
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