I saw it just once and was only half paying attention, I’m no movie critic either, but here goes. If I were to rate this on a cocktail scale I’d give it a vodka soda.

I enjoyed the premise, the performances, and the tropes of The Menu more than anything else in the movie. Ralph Fiennes’ excellent portrayal of Julian, an egomaniac/brilliant chef/tortured artist, was spot on if…Somewhat cliche, perhaps because it’s something I’m accustomed to? I don’t know. I’ve seen it a lot in the past few decades. Yawn. At this point is the average schmuck aware of the pure megalomania a chef must have in order to be successful? Outside the realm of restaurants, chefs are nobodies just like anyone else, but to foodies and certain restaurant workers they’re like demi-gods and in some instances full blown deities. There’s a reason for this: In most cases, in order to be successful, they must border on pure despotism, insane egomania, and run their restaurants like tyrants because kitchens have to be clean, orderly, and have systems in place to create consistency. Yes, sorry Gen Z, but military style hierarchies do work in the proper conditions. Yes, we live in a “democracy” if that’s what we’re calling it these days, but our collective workplaces, not just restaurants, are commonly dictatorships with most decisions, even stupid ones, made by one person. The chef accentuates this, and their craft, often performed with an insane amount of devotion to their chosen profession, creates fanatics on both sides. This is the part The Menu got right.

The most horrifying area of the movie, however, was unintended. I’m not speaking of the lame and predictable pseudo gory parts intended to shock but rather the possibility this type of place could exist. That people are so rabid about food they’re willing to go to a remote island where fanatically devoted servers and cooks follow a madman into oblivion just to off a few rich assholes. The writers, Will Tracy and Seth Reiss, claim they got the idea for the movie from an actual experience they had. I’ve never heard of anything like it, but I do believe it exists, I mean, Vespertine is/was a thing.

Personally, and please call me jaded, I think the whole foodie craze has gotten out of whack and The Menu at least does a good job of poking fun at the pure ridiculousness of the culture. Yes, my entire living and way of life is based off hoping the upper middle class and lower upper class of Santa Monica and surrounding areas come in to spend money on food (and tip accordingly), but my own tastes are, shall I say, less complicated and much more in line with Anya Taylor Joy’s character, Margot, a former server turned high end prostitute. Cheeseburger please.

Spoiler alert: She’s the one at the end who is spared. And yes, I predicted this way before it happened because, well, cliche is easy to spot.

The writing failed to convince me any sort of empathy for any of the diner victims. A trio of young assholes, two old assholes, a food critic, a jerk off Hollywood type, and Margot’s date, a wealthy, fragile wanna be know it all foodie. Maybe this was their intention but it’s way more interesting when the villains have some skin in the game and you’re actually sad to see them go.

If I could go out on a limb and assume a few things, I would say the writers were satirizing the dining out way of life because it is ridiculous and unfair but the way they did it was plain blatant. Rich people bad, blue collars good.

The biggest hole in this movie is it fails to address humankind’s propensity to become dictators when placed in positions of power and wealth and the way they justify it. In essence, Chef Julian is just a massive hypocrite. He seeks to punish those who he feels aren’t worthy of his “art” but the only reason his art exists in the first place is due to him being a savage dictator and of course having customers (guests) who have enough money to throw away on such a simple necessity as eating.

I would have enjoyed a larger glimpse into the dark psyche of human beings and how even the most common person can be brought into the fold of destroying their moral base over something as simple as money or power or both. Yes, a story as old as time itself but what story, in the end, isn’t about this? Margot is considered “pure” because she refuses to buy into the bullshit but I would have rather seen her go into it with gusto and become corrupted, embrace the rich assholes and fully assassinate her own ethical code in order to get ahead in life, then pull the rug out from under all of them while usurping them and not realizing she’s become what she hated, because, let’s face it, that’s more true to life and people like Margot, those willing to stick to their guns without being total hypocrites themselves, don’t exist. That, my friends, is the real horror story.