Certain movies are called “passion projects” for a reason. It often involves a filmmaker leaving his or her comfort zone to make something different that they still care deeply about. But it also involves putting your personality as an artist on the line. In fact “passion project” is sometimes used as a slight against artists when it seems like they’ve made something for themselves and no one else.
With “Chef,” John Favreau may have just made a passion project about passion projects. The story about cooking and food is easy enough to swallow, but the special sauce are all the transparent parallels to Favreau’s career as a filmmaker and trying to be a populist artist while inside a system that saps creativity. Continue reading “Chef”