What's Cooking? is well-acted, but the scenes sometimes sink into melodrama as characters scream at each other, and the movie as a whole is too lightweight and forgettable.
What's Cooking? is well-acted, but the scenes sometimes sink into melodrama as characters scream at each other, and the movie as a whole is too lightweight and forgettable.
Kenyan-born, London-educated Indian filmmaker Gurinder Chadha follows up on her debut hit Bhaji on the Beach (1994) with this gentle look at multiculturalism in Los Angeles. The film details the lives of four ethnically diverse families -- black, Latino, Jewish, and Asian -- during one frantic Thanksgiving. The film opens with Ronald (Dennis Haysbert), an African-American who works as a spin doctor for the Republican politico; he and his wife Audrey (Alfre Woodard) are in the midst of preparing
for their white dinner guests. Meanwhile, at the Latino household, young Anthony Avila (Douglas Spain) invites his womanizing father for Thanksgiving dinner, unbeknownst to his schoolteacher mother Elisabeth (Mercedes Ruehl). At the same time, the Seeling family is confronted with their daughter Rachel's (Kyra Sedwick) lesbianism, when she brings home her lover Carla (Julianna Margulies). Finally, Vietnamese immigrant Trinh Nguyen (Joan Chen) struggles to understand her Americanized children after she discovers condoms in her eldest daughter's jacket and a gun in her son's room. ~ Jonathan Crow, Rovi
This valentine to the cultural diversity that defines L.A. is a second-tier Altman (or even Paul Thomas Anderson)a broad, accessible comedy that contrasts four large and dynamic families residing on the same street: Latino, black, Jewish, and Asian.
Chadha juggles her characters so deftly that we never get tired of any of them and eagerly look forward to returning to each table as her camera jumps around.
Patient viewers will find that by the time the sparks start to fly and the tears to flow, the wait will have been worth it, to say nothing of the laughs.
Great actors, but not very interesting storyline. A little too stereotypical, a lot too trite and concocted. Entertaining enough to watch to its conclusion, but not a very satisfying movie in the end.
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