Eat Drink Man Woman Film Difficulty Ranking: 2
If you like food, Eat Drink Man Woman is your film. It’s at the centre of the Chu family from Taipei. It brings them together, it fuels their romantic escapes, and even brings them in touch with their past. It’s a guide through life in Taiwan.
From: Taiwan, Asia
Watch: Trailer, Free on Tubi, Rent on Amazon, Buy on Amazon
Next: Like Water for Chocolate, Mi Familia, Lamb
Why Watch Eat Drink Man Woman?
- If your Instagram feed is full of pictures of food
- To see one of Taiwanese maestro Ang Lee’s earliest films
- Get a feel for life in Taiwan
- If you like easy going family drama’s like Mi Familia
The Breakdown
If you like Chinese cooking, the opening of Eat Drink Man Woman is a treat. Ang Lee takes you from the chaos of a busy street intersection in Taipei into the organised kitchen of master chef Mr. Chu to see the assortment of Chinese delicacies he is cooking for his three daughters. For him, the weekly Sunday feast he prepares is one of his obligations to his daughters, a kind of ritual. But for his daughters, it’s a weekly tradition they’re always desperate to escape.
Every week they sit there and silently make inroads into the feast their father has prepared. The only times the silence is disrupted is to make awkward family announcements (they’re engaged or expecting a baby) which they only reveal to excuse them from future family meetings.
In between the weekly feasts we get a glimpse into each of the three sister’s lives. They’re all very different. The eldest is a staunch Christian that teaches in a local school. The youngest is a student who works part time at the local fast food chain (Wendy’s). And in the middle there’s the pretty one whose life is consumed by her office job. Together they give us a cross-section of life as a woman in Taipei
What about Food?
In Eat Drink Man Woman, food is much more than simple nourishment. In Eat Drink Man Woman, food is life.
- It brings people together: it brings the family together every week and helps Mr. Chu’s little neighbour to make friends at school.
- It’s memory: taste brings back nostalgic memories of the middle-daughter’s childhood.
- It fuels romance: between Mr. Chu and his neighbour as well as his daughters and their relationships.
What to Watch Next?
If you want to watch another film with food at it’s heart, check out Like Water for Chocolate. It’s a Mexican film focused on food and romance. There’s also Jiro Dreams of Sushi if you’re a sushi/food lover.
Or if you’re looking for another easy-going family film, check out Mi Familia to see a Mexican-American family growing up in Los Angeles over a few generations.
You could also check out Lamb which follows an Ethiopian boy determined to cook like his mum despite patriarchal pressure to ‘be a man’.
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