Wonderful character development!

Just perfect...

It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

WHAT'S COOKING? (2000) ***1/2 Mercedes Ruehl, Joan Chen, Alfre Woodard, Kyra Sedgwick, Julianna Marguilies, Dennis Haysbert, Maury Chaykin, Lainie Kazan, Victor Rivers, Douglas Spain, A Martinez, Francois Chau, Will Yun Lee, Estelle Harris, Ralph Manza. Wonderful sleeper depicting four Los Angeles melting pot families all celebrating Thanksgiving, cross cutting between homes sharing the universal theme of family, love and ultimately acceptance of one another. Funny, emotional, intelligent and superbly acted with an equally impressive script by Gurinder Chadha (who directed) and Paul Mayeda Berges her real-life companion. Stand out performances especially by Ruehl, Chen & Woodard as strong-willed matriarchs and Sedgwick and Marguilies as one of the sexiest onscreen lesbian couples in some time. Kudos to the off-screen cooks who whip up some truly mouth-watering displays in uniquely different yet delicious dinners for the quartet broods.

This is absolutely one of the best movies I've ever seen, and I can see it over and over again and discover new details and get fascinated of the story and all the actors' good work.Watching this film is taking a joyride. All the different stories, and they are many and seems somewhat confusing in the beginning, is tied together as one in the end.

The film was half over before I managed to figure out what was going on. It's a dog's breakfast of a movie about four family Thanksgiving dinners. The cliches and stereotypes tumble over each other. When it's all over ten hours later --- well, it seems like ten hours --- you're puzzling over what it was all about. I don't want to see a movie about dinner table squabbling. There is enough of it in my own family. The turkeys looked pretty good. The rest gave me indigestion.

Spoilers herein.I got around to viewing this film recently, as it was on two of my `too see' lists: the Food and Joan Chen lists.Food films are a new genre that can impress. `Eat Drink Man Woman,' `In the Mood for Love' and `Big Night' were successes. The images touch sensory memories that extend the visual vocabulary. It is both enjoyable and intellectually satisfying. But this pedestrian film fails to evoke those memories.The Joan Chen connection seems one worth following. She is sort of a minor phenomenon, which I first noticed with `Autumn in NY.' that film's subject was just as unremarkable as this. But it was so well constructed I spend all my viewing time marveling at the craftsmanship. As an actress, she's understated -- a contrast to the hispanically demonstrable Ruhl, but very apt. A study in dramatizing the Asian woman which is quite a challenge since the starting point is deliberately undramatic. I think this same challenge was behind `Fargo,' the notion of drama among a practiced non-dramatic people.Chen intrigues me. I'm going to check out her `Send Down Girl' and get back to you.