Review of The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover

The central paradox of Peter Greenaway’s “The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover” is that it manages to contain scenes of unspeakable and unutterable cruelty and sadism, and yet throughout there is a palpable sense of compassion and humanism. This is a film which opens with a man being forced to eat dog excrement, and yet it reduced me nearly to tears with its scenes of love-making. It contains perhaps one of the most evil characters seen in a film, and also one of the most stirring romances. It is a film which plumbs the depths of the most transgressive and despicable of human behaviour, and also presents us at our best. It’s a film composed entirely of dichotomies and juxtapositions, but instead of frightening or overwhelming the audience, it transfixes and absorbs.  

Let me explain. Michael Gambon plays Albert Spica, who is a snarling beast of a man. Every other word out of his mouth is an insult, a command, or both. He presides over the Le Hollandais restaurant, and day in, day out takes a seat there at the centre of a table, with his wife Georgina (Helen Mirren) on his right side, surrounded by his lackeys. His behaviour is, to put it mildly, terrible. He thinks nothing of humiliating everyone in his company, especially Georgina, and he is prone to intensely violent outbursts, such as in one very distressing scene where he destroys his entire kitchen. Georgina is brittle, and yet composed; she is used to and tolerates her husband’s behaviour, but does not allow herself to be dragged down with it. Early on in the film, she locks eyes with the mysterious, book-reading patron sat at a table by the front door. He, Michael (Alan Howard), starts an affair with her, and the scenes with them together were the ones I found most affecting. Finally, there is the chef; a composed Frenchman called Richard Borst (Richard Bohringer), he is the omnipresent eye of the restaurant, who sees all, understands all, and knows what to say and to who. He provides the rooms, and cover, for Michael and Georgina’s affair.

The plot, taken by itself, would be contrived and relatively dull, so what is this film actually about? That in itself is hard to say. Many have posited a political reading of the film, and whilst I can understand that, we are living well outside of the Thatcher era and the film still has unspeakable power. It is too good to be reduced to a political allegory. Instead, I think the best approach to the film is to treat it as an essay on human nature. This explains why the film can be so grotesque, and yet so beautiful; we are being presented with both of those extremes in unflinching detail, and as an audience we cannot help but be humbled. It helps that Greenaway has an instinctive and visceral eye for what we as human beings respond to; the screams of a child, the beauty of well-prepared food, the horror of seeing someone create a scene in a restaurant, the union of a couple who are in love. 

A further paradox is how the film, which is very clearly shot on a set, is so cinematic. This could only exist as a film, and it uses all of the aspects of the medium. Michael Nyman’s score is a masterpiece in and of itself, accentuating scenes and lending a pompous formality in all the right places. The camerawork is to die for. The film is shot largely (but not completely) on a 180 degree plane, with shots that are often symmetrical, The camera has a habit of gliding in and out of rooms, and in an early scene we are taken through the industrial, gloomy outside into the sparse kitchen which is densely populated with people chopping, frying, saucing and plucking, and then into the lavish restaurant, which has a red décor. The lighting, too, lends an enormous amount to the film, with the harsh red lighting in the hallways, the white lighting of the bathroom (which is the cleanest room in the film), the dark black of the outside setting. It is a film composed entirely of broad strokes, and it seems fitting for a film which has a number of crucial scenes centred around books that Greenaway has an authorly control over everything that is going on in each scene. He approaches something operatic, and indeed, his crescendo, the final scene, is a piece of startling, astonishing cinema that is simply unforgettable.

It is also worth mentioning that, as well as being an essay on human nature, the film too works as a study of appearance, utilising its artifice to say something about artifice. I have mentioned the tracking shot from outside through the kitchen and into the restaurant; whilst that could be taken, and appreciated, as masterly film-making and pure cinema, it also works very well as a tour through the human body; we start with the outside aspects which influence us (the ingredients being delivered), which go through the brain (the kitchen, where men and women repetitiously chop), and then out of our mouths and into the wider world (the restaurant, where Michael Gambon spits and snarls at everyone in his company). As this film chillingly highlights, sometimes that process goes horribly wrong.

A lot of the effect, too, comes from the actors. Gambon in particular is fearless, committing fully to a role which most other actors wouldn’t touch, but for me the most affecting role in the film was Mirren’s, and her love affair with Michael was the reason why the film was as impactful as it was. There came with it the genuine feeling of a couple falling in love, and this belies the film’s true, humanistic core. Because there are, truly, some terrible things in this film. But, because we are allowed to condemn them, we are reminded of a common humanity. This is reinforced by the films reliance on the truly universal aspects of existence; food, sex, violence, fear, taboos, vomit. Only someone with something missing inside would not be repulsed by this film. Which is why it’s so beautiful.