Delicious and delightful, this German farce about a Greek/German restaurateur had us howling with laughter and tapping our feet to the kick-ass soundtrack. Though the Doors song is missing, our hero Zinos sports a Jim Morrison haircut. Co-writer Adam Bousdoukos plays it straight as the beleaguered Zinos, while the better-known Moritz Bleibtreu plays his brother Ilias with a comic flair not seen in his earlier work (Run Lola Run (1998), Munich (2005), The Baader Meinhof Complex (2008), among others). Moritz's mother Monica Bleibtreu has a cameo as Nadine's grandmother (she's in the photo I linked above) but sadly died in May 2009, before the movie was released anywhere. Director/co-writer Fatih Akin (no, not Faith) is a German man of Turkish descent, and there are a few Turkish references as well as the Greek ones, including the casting of Turkish actor Birol Ünel as the volatile chef Shayn. The only one of Akin's movies I've seen is his segment of New York, I Love You, but will definitely watch for him from now on. Newcomer Anna Bederke is funny as waitress Lucia. But it's Akin's and Bousdoukos's writing that really sparkles. Warning: don't read the synopses. Every one that I've seen is full of spoilers.
The soundtrack details are, for a change, listed on imdb. As I said, we loved the music, soul and otherwise. If I had thought of it earlier, I would have a list on the blog of wonderful music movies, and this would go on it. However, I do have a list of food movies, which I'm pushing up to a later publishing date, with this added, because the food stylings are great. We think it's better than its 75% rating from critics and 77% from audiences on rottentomatoes, and can whole-heartedly recommend this (to adults--there's sex in it!).
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