Nobody breaks a sweat in “The Style of Issues” — they glow. Nobody swears or yells “Nook!” or “Sure, chef!” — they whisper, or just ship an approving look of gustatory satisfaction. That is the anti-“Bear,” a sensuous fantasia of gastronomical pleasure much less redolent of the Beef than “Babette’s Feast.”
And, for a 12 months rife with parlous politics and jittery tradition, “The Style of Issues” is simply what’s wanted for some cinematic self-soothing. Tailored from Marcel Rouff’s novel “The Life and Ardour of Dodin-Bouffant, Gourmand” by Anh Hung Tran, who earned his foodie-film bona fides with 1993’s “The Scent of Inexperienced Papaya,” “The Style of Issues” marks a welcome return of the great, old style artwork movie that doesn’t dwell on the sting however as an alternative rewards our want for escapism, on this case centered on bygone values of discretion, etiquette, noblesse oblige and sweetness for its personal sake. If such indulgence suggestions into its personal model of fetishism and complacency, effectively, that may be the value one pays for watching one of many display screen’s most luminous actresses sizzle fish roe in butter, make completely formed quenelles, put together rooster combs with carrots and crayfish, and poach a turbot in milk, lemon and herbs, solely not often shedding that Mona Lisa smile.
The sources of Eugénie’s personal pleasure — and ache — ultimately come to mild in a movie that evolves from what appears to be a traditional upstairs-downstairs drama into one thing extra nuanced and sudden. Dodin, modeled after the French creator and culinary grasp Jean Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, clearly adores and respects Eugénie, as do the chums who repeatedly meet in a form of prototypical slow-food motion; once they moan and slurp whereas consuming millet-gorged ortolans behind linen napkins, the scene resembles excessive monks worshiping in their very own peculiar sanctum sanctorum. In the meantime, Eugénie has taken an curiosity in a younger protégée, Violette’s niece Pauline (Bonnie Chagneau-Ravoire), who’s possessed of an unusually discriminating palate.
Binoche is so gifted, she now not appears to behave anymore: She simply is, in all her serene confidence and bodily charisma, and “The Style of Issues” offers the best showcase for these ineffable items. The truth that she and Magimel had been as soon as a pair in actual life provides the story what seems to be an appropriately mournful frisson, and Tran movies them in golden, sun-kissed mild, swinging the digicam simply between them as they examine recipes and menus. (The movie’s sound design is equally luxurious, ensuring the viewers can hear even the mild bumping of boiling eggs.)
The category striations of “The Style of Issues” are appealingly ambiguous, because the servants are proven to be connoisseurs each bit as refined because the served. Dodin and Eugénie’s relationship, nevertheless, marks a delicate reversion to kind, because it turns into clear that her worth lies primarily in her means to translate his genius to the plate. Plus ça change, as Dodin and his circle may say over glasses of wine in his flawlessly appointed eating room. Even when issues stubbornly keep the identical, although, they’ll style awfully good.
PG-13. At space theaters. Accommodates some sensuality, partial nudity and smoking. In French with subtitles. 134 minutes.
