9/06/2012

"A place with waiters and trayless waiters"

Title: Chef´s Special
Year: 2008
Genre: Comedy, Romance
Director: Nacho G. Velilla
Writer: Oriol Capel, David S. Olivas, Antonio Sánchez, Nacho G. Velilla
Runtime: 111min
Cast: Javier Cámara, Lola Dueñas, Benjamín Vicuña, Fernando Tejera, Alejandra Lorenzo, Junio Valverde
Produc.: Ensueño Films, Antena 3 Televisión, Canguro Produzioni Internazionali Cinematografiche
Budget: € 400 million approx.

In Chef's Special, Maxi (Javier Cámara) is an excellent chef, of homosexual inclination, whose work in his restaurant is disrupted when he has to take care of his two children, recently motherless. At the same time, he and his waitress Alex (Lola Dueñas) meet his new apartment neighbor, Horacio (Benjamín Vicuña), for whom they both feel attracted.
Maxi owns "The Xantarella" a Madrid restaurant, located in the district of Chueca. For him, his greatest aspiration has always been to show off to the critics, so he can be able to consolidate himself, earning a Michelin star. Since this is a comedy, it is precisely that one of the first funny situations happens when Ramiro (Fernando Tejera), in charge of the desserts, confuses a representative of tires with a critic.
Also that day, Alex shows up in the kitchen, cursing all men, dripping tears and drinking alcohol, frustrated with her last relationship.
This is how, in a few minutes, the director has presented the type of character that would be necessary, so that later, we can laught out loud.
Soon after, two situations occur that lead the poor Maxi to feel he is into trouble. On the one hand, the mother of his children (with whom things were already over long ago, and who now had a terminal illness), dies, leaving him Alba (Alejandra Lorenzo), a girl, and Edu (Junio ​​Valverde), a teenager. For Maxi, none of this was in his plans and he is terrified, not knowing what to do.
As if this were not enough, a new neighbor, former argentinian footballer Horacio moves into his building, resulting in Alex´s immediate crush on him, and that her behavior becomes stunned, not aware that such a handsome young man actually plays for the other team.
Chef's Special is a comedy that takes advantage of the mysteries of the search for love (be it, of whatever type), but above all and most of all, using the always controversial issue of discrimination. The jokes, though somewhat heavy, never fall into vulgarity. What the film clearly gives to understand, is that any homosexual willing to enjoy it, should be, with the film, able to laugh at oneself.
It is a proposal that has managed to combine very good humor, with the transmission of values, knowing Nacho G. Velilla quite well, when it was time to joke, and when, the time of delivering a good message of acceptance, in a society that is exclusive.
Also, it is granted some space to the matter of the single parent family, which neither encourages nor punishes. We are simply described the meaning of having to live in such circumstances. In this case, where we have, on the one hand, a man who, for the first time must exercise that role without even beeing sure of wanting it. And on the other hand, with two kids, who at the recent death of their mother, must get used to living with someone with whom until then, they had never had any connection.

My rating: 7/10


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