Variously titled in French La Passion de Dodin Bouffant and Pot-au-feu, Tran’s film is not easy to label. While cinema exploits two of our senses – sight and sound – this seeks to convey taste, smell and even touch through the medium of gastronomy. But this isn’t the food-porn familiar from TV and Instagram. The opening, near-wordless scene (which owes a satirical debt to Jules Dassin’s Rififi) emphasises the physical labour and skill involved in the preparation of sophisticated dishes. 

The story is one of a mature romance, inevitably suggesting parallels with a fine wine or a richly simmering stew. Dodin, a wealthy gourmand, creates menus that his cook and lover Eugénie prepares in the large kitchen of his country estate in France, the meals to be enjoyed by his circle of bourgeois epicurean friends. Binoche and Magimel, previously partners in real-life, convey an affectionate familiarity but also hint at the sharper aspects of a relationship that crosses class boundaries, and in Eugénie’s reluctance to marry even point to an emergent feminism. 

With its sensuality and the employment of food to stimulate memory it is redolent of a famous fin de siècle literary work, Proust’s À la recherche du temps perdu, as much as any cinematic forbears such as Gabriel Axel’s Babette’s Feast (1987) or Tran’s own debut The Scent of Green Papaya (1993). But like those earlier films, it is also a satisfying feast that leaves you wanting more.

“[This is a movie] where elements of joy and sorrow, humor and intensity, beauty and light and shadow combine in a perfectly balanced experience. It takes patience and skill, but also nerve and luck for a work of art to achieve elegance and piquancy in equal measure.” Alissa Wilkinson, New York Times.

“Far fewer films explore the comfortable familiarity of a love that has endured and deepened over decades. Vanishingly rare are pictures that capture this kind of relationship so satisfyingly.” Wendy Ide, Observer.