Ramen Chef: You stupid amateurs could never appreciate my noodles!

Tampopo: But people who eat noodles are all amateurs! So why make noodles amateurs can’t appreciate?

This film is food. More so, it is a display of the appreciation for good food. Long seen as a Japanese classic, ‘Tampopo’ (タンポポ) is a story about a lonely widower who is encouraged to improve her ramen making skills and turn her failing restaurant into a success.

The main plot involves truck driver Goro (Yamazaki Tsutomu) and his colleague Gun (Watanabe Ken) stopping off at a ramen joint to get some food. Tampopo (Miyamoto Nobuko) runs the restaurant after the death of her husband, and is running it poorly. After criticising Tampopo’s noodles and getting in a fight with the hefty Pisken (Yasuoka Rikiya), Goro agrees to teach Tampopo and make her noodles great.

Directed by Juzo Itami, Tampopo has a delightful cast, including Yamazaki Tsutomu as the experienced truck driver Goro and a young Watanabe Ken as Gun. The film is a little quirky and has some side-plots that leave you thinking ‘What the hell?!…’, but generally it is an enjoyable film. Tampopo also has a very strong following of people who love Ramen.

There are several sub-plots to the film, all having something to do with food. The old woman who likes to squeeze food. The con artist who loves pancake rolls. They are all pretty peculiar, but entertaining nonetheless.

Many scenes have gained a lot of reputation. The opening scene is almost like a mantra on how to eat noodles. The sphagetti scene in the french restaurant shatters preconceptions about how foreigners eat.

A much loved scene is the hobo scene, where Goro takes Tampopo and her son to see a group of homeless food connoisseurs. [The expressions on their faces, they make me laugh every time!] The part where one of the hobos sneaks into a restaurant with Tampopo’s son to make him a rice omelette feels like a Warner Brother’s cartoon, as the avoid the security guard. Genius. Futurama pays tribute to this scene in the episode ‘30% Iron Chef’, where bender cooks for a group of hobos and learns the secret of flavour.

I recommend watching this film, and I’d give it 4.5 stars out of 5. Sure, the plot drifts at time, but the general feel of the film makes it enjoyable to watch. Take a look at the trailer, not the best trailer in the world but it gives you an idea.

On a similar note, out last year is a hollywood film called ‘The Ramen Girl’, which seems to share a similar storyline. I haven’t seen it yet, but from the trailer my thoughts are ‘meh’. Still, it has Yamazaki Tsutomu as the old ramen master, so i’ll have to wait and see. Here’s the trailer if you are interested. I’m not sure Brittany Murphy is the right person for the main role though.