78
Paste Magazine by Andrew Crump
Like the best “food porn” movies, Ramen Shop is an expression of authentic passion, the kind fostered by abiding connections not simply to food but to the people, places and times food recalls.
Ramen Shop (家族のレシピ)
Critic Rating
(read reviews)User Rating
- Singapore,
- Japan,
- France
- 2018
- · 89m
Director
Eric Khoo
Cast
Takumi Saitoh,
Seiko Matsuda,
Jeanette Aw,
Tsuyoshi Ihara,
Mark Lee,
Tetsuya Bessho
Genre
Drama
Masato is a young ramen chef. After the sudden death of his father, he chances upon a suitcase of memorabilia – filled with musings and old photos – left behind by his Singaporean mother. Acting on a hunch, he takes off for Singapore with the notebook, hoping to piece together the story of his life, as well as that of his parents.
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What are critics saying?
75
Film Threat by Alan Ng
Ihara and Aw’s love story feels real and plays well as represented through fine cuisine.
75
RogerEbert.com by Monica Castillo
Ramen Shop believes that the healing power of food can satisfy our hunger for comfort in difficult times, and that should be filling enough for now.
75
The Film Stage
Ramen Shop has its charms, but it’s a bit too lightweight to leave a lasting impact.
75
The Film Stage by Jaime Grijalba
Ramen Shop has its charms, but it’s a bit too lightweight to leave a lasting impact.
75
San Francisco Chronicle by Walter Addiego
The overall mood is out-and-out misty-eyed, a feeling emphasized by the movie’s piano score. Ramen Shop has some flaws — the movie jumps jarringly back and forth in time — but voluptuous closeups of delightful dishes like chilli crab make up for a lot.
67
The A.V. Club by Katie Rife
If you can tolerate a little saccharine piano music and ethereal backlighting with your food porn, Ramen Shop is an appetizing little bite of multicultural foodie edutainment.
60
The New York Times by Ben Kenigsberg
A drama from the Singaporean director Eric Khoo that also demonstrates the power of Instagrammable cuisine to spice up an otherwise straightforward, sentimental film.
60
Variety by Maggie Lee
Bringing two of Singapore and Japan’s most popular dishes (bak kut teh and ramen) together in a film about cultural and culinary fusion, Singaporean auteur Eric Khoo’s “Ramen Teh” is cinematically more comfort food than haute cuisine.
60
The Hollywood Reporter by Deborah Young
It is saved by its underlying theme of forgiveness and reconciliation between long-estranged family members, for whom the cruel memory of the Japanese invasion and occupation of Singapore during World War 2 is still alive.
50
Washington Post by Ann Hornaday
For all of its foodie appeal, however, Ramen Shop is a wispily sentimental enterprise, full of perfunctory transitions, maudlin plot twists and awkward time shifts between past and present.
50
Slant Magazine by Peter Goldberg
Its drawn-out descriptions of culinary traditions and practices are enticing enough, but the same can’t be said about the characterizations.
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