summary of two films on food

Eat Drink Man Woman
"This film tells the story of a semi-retired and widowed Chinese master chef at the Taipei Grand Hotel. Chef Chu (Sihung Lung) and his family are living in modern day Taipei, Taiwan. At the start of the film, he lives with his three attractive daughters, all of whom are unattached. The three daughters are: Jia-Jen, the oldest one (Kuei-Mei Yang), a school teacher nursing a broken heart; Jia-Chien, the middle one (Chien-lien Wu), a career woman; Jia-Ning, the youngest one (Yu-Wen Wang), a twenty year old As the film progresses, each daughter encounters new men. When these new relationships blossom, their roles are broken and the living situation within the family changes."

The most impressing dialogue in the movie is this:" life is not like cooking; you can not prepare every ingredient well and then start cooking."

This movie take Chinese cuisine as a clue for a typical Chinese family life. I think food in this movie is highly connected with family, which is a very important issue in Chinese culture.

The chef of south polar

This is a Japanese movie. This movie tells a story of a chef, who works in the Japanese research station on south polar. Through food, the workers of the station bring courage, consolation, strength and warmth together for the station "family", which lives in such a severe natural environment. I think here, food also provides some features of "family". By saying family, I mean not only literal family, but also the sense of belonging.