The Menu * * * ½

In this film Ralph Fiennes plays Chef Slowik who's restaurant is regarded as one of the worlds finest. His restaurant is set on an island so no one can easily just walk away,  (though after a short while, everyone wants to).

I think the next course will surprise you.

A group of diners are personally invited by Chef Slowik. The boat arrives and the guests are given a tour.   Everything that goes on the table is produced on the island, from seafood to meat to vegetables to grain. The staff all live on the island.  The staff  share a dorm where beds are in neat rows with no regard for their privacy. Who would happily live like that?  People who are under the spell of a perverse messianic leader that's who!

This place has shades of Jonestown, as the slavish robotic behaviour of the restaurant staff will show.

As the meal progresses Chef Slowik begins to behave more erratically.  Some of the guests are under the impression it's just theatre but they soon learn otherwise as very real murder, suicide, torture and mayhem unfolds in between exquisitely prepared courses.  

Chef Slowik explains that he wants out of the business. He believes the type of guests he has invited - pretentious food critics, gluttons, food bloggers, name droppers  etc - along with himself - are the very reason the restaurant business has declined into irredeemable decadence and pretentiousness.
(I remember Pig, sent a similar message).

One guest Margot, (Anya Taylor-Joy)  actually shouldn't be there. She was never personally invited. She has a profession that is similar to Chef Slowik in that she is paid to please the sensuality of others. As the story unfolds her significance increases - and so does our sympathy for her. 

I'm always up for good horror and The Menu offers several courses of drownings, shootings, amputation and psychological torture delivered with a rich sauce of black humour and a rather cheeky message.