In recent years Hollywood has bent over backwards remaking - euphemism for ruining - fine French films (Le Jour se leve, La Salaire de la peur, Les Diaboliques, La Cage aux folles, L'Emmerdeur, Diner du cons), just for openers so it's refreshing to see the trend reversed but without the destructive element. If your memory stretches back to the 'golden' age then you will surely remember the one about the husband/wife missing lo, these many years until the widow/widower feels able to remarry and then, just when everything in the garden is rosy the missing-presumed-dead spouse turns up ready to resume his/her life having been 'lost' on a remote island all the time. Somerset Maugham started it all in a stage play which was subsequently filmed and spawned spin-offs and several years ago the French jumped on the bandwagon with Cuisine de la buerre, a vehicle for Fernandel and Bourvil. The title, roughly translatable as Cooking With Butter, referred to the cuisine of Normandy as opposed to the South of France where oil is the ingredient of choice. One of the two restaurant owners - either Fernandel or Bourvil - was from Normandy and his widow had remarried a restaurant owner from Provence - a similar theme was explored in the recent German film, Mostly Martha, in which the heavy, lard-based German cooking was contrasted with the lighter, oil-based variety from Italy. French Cuisine then is a remake of Cuisine de la buerre, itself, as we now know, based on the Hollywood 'guy who came back' cycle. This is a totally delightful divertissment guaranteed to keep you entertained and amused for its allotted running time. More we cannot ask.
Review of French Cuisine
