Movie Review - Boiling Point

Director: Philip Barantini
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 92 minutes
Year: 2022
Starring: Stephen Graham, Vinette Robinson, Alice Feetham, Ray Panthaki, Hannah Walters, Malachi Kirby, Izuka Hoyle, Taz Skylar, Lauryn Ajufo, Jason Flemyng, Lourdes Faberes, Áine Rose Daly
 
Description: Enter the relentless pressure of a restaurant kitchen as a head chef (Stephen Graham) wrangles his team on the busiest day of the year.

Review: The pressure on the chefs and waiters is well displayed in a London restaurant as chef Andy Jones must do his utmost to keep things together. A behind-the-scenes look at a busy London restaurant, it sounds like a documentary, but it isn’t. In one fluid take, the chaotic Friday night at a restaurant is depicted. Several perspectives are followed, but the anchor, our main character is chef Andy Jones. The film begins as he is on his way to the restaurant to begin his shift. “Boiling Point” manages to portray the perspectives of all the restaurant employees well. As a viewer, you sympathize with the service staff who have to deal with demanding, annoying and sometimes racist costumers, and you feel a surge of stress when seeing the struggles in the kitchen. All the people both staff and customers, feel extremely real. By the end of the film, you feel like you got to know some of these people.

Director and writer Philip Barantini has a background as an actor, restaurant worker and chef. The experience he brings with him is extremely valuable: this includes knowledge not only about food preparation, but also about the hierarchy and atmosphere in a kitchen and cooperation with the service staff. To familiarize the actors with this, Barantini had the cast watch along at various restaurants so they could properly convey the authenticity of their roles.

“Boiling Point” is a unique film and deserves all the praise it’s been getting. The actors are all fantastic and deliver realistic performances. The camera work is tremendously clever and makes the whole thing a special viewing experience. The fact that this film was done in one take just amazes me. “Boiling Point” is definitely one of the best films of 2022.

Rating: 5/ 5