Tampopo

The wonderful main course was only made better by the side dishes. Funny and well laid out, the only thing that bothered me were the awkward and abrupt cutscenes.

Tampopo is the greatest food movie of all time. (Other contenders: Babette's Feast, Big Night, Man Woman Eat Drink) The late Juzo Itami directs his usual company in a series of short pieces that examine food in all of its manifestations and meanings to humanity. A unifying plotline concerns the efforts of a trucker to aid a widow trying to run a noodle stand and by the quest for "noodles with sincerity". A great, funny movie!

Food as sustenance, sex, romance, passion, work, play, noise, mischief, knowledge, perseverance, crime, life, death, friendship. This movie will teach you everything you will ever need to know about food. except how to cook I guess

One of those sneaky-great films that proves that greatness can come in an endless variety of shapes and sizes (which, it occurs to me, is a pretty fair synopsis of the plot as well). A celebration of the love, joy, and comfort which great cooking can bring, dashed off with just enough surreal irreverence and humor to make it truly unique. I fucking love ramen.

A supremely oddball set of loosely connected vignettes about delicious food and its connection with life itself. Seems like a lot of these segments ended before they could really make a statement, but it was still a largely enjoyable way to trigger all of my food cravings.

The best movie about noodles I've ever seen.

life is food; food is life. A "Ramen Eastern" (Spaghetti Western--get it?)

It's like Bunuel in Japan, though that is not to cheapen its charm by likening it to something else. It has a taste all its own. Satirical and ridiculous, but at the same time strikingly genuine. A comedic masterpiece.

One of the great non-narratives in the history of film. Simply connected through the human necessity to ingest, the stories are ridiculous, albeit bizarrely relatable: the housewife who cooks One Last Meal, the Western spaghetti eater (not spaghetti western, although there's some of that too) and the Woman in the Grocery are standouts. Best viewed with a bowl of good ramen.

Oh, the joys of food and sex. One of the best films for showing Japanese culture as well. It's got the noodles you want.

I'm hungry as hell.

Accurately labeled as the first noodle western, this food-obsessed, genre mocking and highly inventive comedy is thoroughly enjoyable and even bears some insightful observations about the links of food with sex, death, and even the business world. Probably the best film made about food, just don't watch it on an empty stomach.

I just don't get what's supposed to be so clever and funny about this one

I enjoy the meta-romanticisization of food and the story about following your purpose, savoring the moments along the way with your friends

One of the most unclassifiable, bizarre, and endearingly funny films of the 1980s which I can't believe it took me so long to see, as it's been on my radar for decades. It's so delectably strange that like a classic dish, it will never go out of style.

I didn't love this as much as many, and found most of the little vignettes interspersed throughout a bit of a distraction, but it's a mostly charming, feel good comedy with an unusual premise. It's not really all that funny for a comedy, but it will make you smile.

Warm film, great food. Lovely actor playing the woman

For a film that is such a committed celebration of food, it sure does get absolutely disgusting with food at times. UGH, the live shrimps, UGH, the egg yolk regurgitating, I felt like I was gonna puke

An unusual combination of humour, love, death, sex, and food. Some very funny sketches and some really interesting, unique sequences, but didn't work all that well for me overall.

10.12.22(+)akyaka

A 1980s Japanese comedy/drama/western all about (all about) food - and its involvement in preparation, dining, consumption and sex. It chiefly focuses on the art of cooking Ramen, while occasionally going on other little food-related sketch-tangents that, due to the way the film navigates them, almost feel Pythonesque. It's weird, it's funny, it's meta, it's fantastic.

I love how outrageous the scenes are

assorted vignettes on relationships to food, driven by an overarching western-type noodle story. funny throughout with some good shots even

Forget the ramen, I'll never look at a raw egg the same way again! The intertwining of food and sex - shall we call it culinary eroticism? - is entrancing and kind of a combination of 'In The Realm Of The Senses' and Buñuel's distinctive portrayal of human sexual desire (often of the taboo kind).

a comic ode to food that's sneakily about movies too. both can serve as equaliser between classes and genders and cultures and even, as demonstrated by a handful of moving late scenes and a closing shot that had me welling up, life and death. if the ultimate point is to invest your creations with as much love and diverse experience as possible, it shines as its own brightest example.

Maybe just because I really love noodles.

Very charming and original.

Great fun. I loved the interludes throughout the main story. Their thematic connection--the love of food--serves to undergird Tampopo's story of becoming a better ramen cook. The whole film combines these disparate ingredients into a delightful meal filled with humor and (not too schmaltzy) sentiment.

Heartwarming farce about food. Feels like a more toned-down Monty Python set in Japan. A weird one.

Student of ramen eating: "One fine day... I went out with an old man. He's studied noodles for 40 years. He was showing me the right way to eat them."

Probably best viewed with a native Japanese guide, this is an endearing story with sometimes quirky humor and hidden layers that Westerners might not understand.

Such an uplifting and positive film. Most of it is pretty random, but it offers non-stop entertainment.

Watching this was delightful. Before I knew it, my worries in life briefly melted away. Watching Tampopo improve her ramen so eagerly is as pure as cinematic joys can get. Simple, sophisticated, warm, and surprising. And also the egg scene.

Weirder than I thought. The western aspect is actually so great

The film looks beautiful, with some fantastic blocking and cinematography, including an impressive amount of one-shots. The story does get drawn out a bit too much, and the pacing kind of shoots itself in the foot when it goes off tangent in various parts. But it's certainly enjoyable.

How food connects us all to life, love, sex, death, humor, and loss. The film is quirky and full of a wonderful optimism. A joy from start to finish.

Jûzô Itami's direction is absolutely fantastic in this film. He crafts ensemble scenes so that each character gets ample space to move as well as utilizing blocking to great effect. The premise is also incredibly original and creative. It is as absurd and humorous as its description leads on. Itami's direction is supplemented by memorable performances from Tsutomu Yamazaki (Gorô) and Nobuko Miyamoto (Tampopo).

Oh man, I want a bowl of Ramen so bad now

Viewed November 13, 2016. Absolutely delightful. I like how it's like eight different movies in one, and we just happen to spend most of the two hours inside of this ramen restaurant, but every digression is just as satisfying. Juzo Itami's love of ramen and of food in general ultimately translates into this boundless love of life. I walked out of the theater feeling extremely refreshed.

A culinary masterpiece

Vignettes are the work of genius.

Mildly interesting, definitely not funny, boring in its premises.

Crazy movie! Badass image and music pairing.

Too long and of uneven quality, but the parts that are good are fantastic. Scenes with the yakuza gourmet are unforgettable.

A brilliantly fun film with maturity way beyond what you'd expect.

I like the main story well enough but I'm nit a fan of the side stories.

If you watch this movie and don't get hungry, you watched it wrong.

Without a doubt, the best japanese comedy about noodles.

Amusing and quirky little film. It's not really my thing, but if you like offbeat humour and love food it may be for you.

The "mock" element in the equation makes excellent sport of all that solemn business of sensei, or "master," in the Japanese tradition; and it makes further sport, somewhat more universally, of the place of priority that food has come to occupy in some people's lives. Like all the better burlesques dating back to _The Rape of the Lock_ or so, this cuts two ways. There is something serious being said about the existential mission of following out one's own destiny

A noodle-western replete with a hero of John Wayne comparisons. Wandering into town this truck driver (with the help of his friends of course) aims to aid a poor window running a down and out noodle shop become the best noodle chef around. Good humor and warmth ensue cooking up a recipe for a deliciously entertaining film. Be careful though, if you haven't eaten in a while prepare for your mouth to water. The film soars through a broad scope of Japanese Cuisine while spinning cooking vignettes.

A beautiful feel-good movie. Made me reconsider ramen as fancy food.

A clever little spoof comedy, not hilarious but funny enough. It's pretty much exactly what everyone says it is: a "noodle western". The way the narrative would sometimes take odd tangents is simultaneously intriguing and distracting. The actors must have gotten damn sick of noodles, though.