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“We wanted to end this meal with a bang, and so we did a lot of research on how to make the specifics of the dessert elements work.” Okay, but why s’mores and not like, a baked Alaska? “When I joined the project, one of the big things I wanted to change about the script was to have this more operatic ending,” Mylod told Eater. Review: If ‘The Menu’ Makes You Uncomfortable, That’s Because It’s Supposed To Where the hell does an idea like this come from?Īccording to Mylod, the dish itself an emulation of chef Grant Achatz’s legendary tabletop dessert at Alinea (which, for the record, does not involve any self-immolation). That seems like a pretty obvious consequence of living in a world where a few people can pay $1,000 for dinner at a place like Hawthorne, while countless others wonder whether they’ll have any dinner at all. While you’re thinking, “Wow, he really is turning these assholes into s’mores,” you’re also kind of excited to see what happens next. What is the film trying to say by turning everyone into human s’mores?Īfter years of serving wealthy, privileged people, Julian would want to get back at them in an especially humiliating way: And is there anything more humiliating than being forced to prepare your body for consumption? After watching these characters behave in the restaurant and learning about their indiscretions outside of it, The Menu encourages us to root for their demise. They’re automatons, moving from one plush experience to the next, and chef Julian’s plot has, essentially, caused them to glitch. It seems as if the characters - all rich people who’ve rarely experienced discomfort in their lives - just play along because they simply cannot fathom what’s happening to them. After a few mealy-mouthed protests at the beginning of the meal, mostly of the “do you know who I am?” variety, they accept their fates. Collectively, the diners trapped at Hawthorne never really try to fight back against chef Julian or escape the island. The pure chaos of this scene - who among us doesn’t want to watch John Leguizamo and Judith Light turn themselves into s’mores - is coupled with the absurdity that the diners are all but willingly participating in their own deaths. Why do the diners in the film willingly do this to themselves? And now, I’ll attempt to unpack the twist ending of The Menu and why it actually somehow actually works. When I first realized what was happening, I felt like I finally understood what The Menu was about.

They willingly don marshmallows and pour chocolate over their heads, and the whole thing goes up in flames. And then, Julian lights the restaurant on fire as the diners turn themselves into human s’mores.

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As his diners watch on in horror, kitchen staffers artfully scatter the restaurant’s dining room with graham cracker crumbs and various sauces.

(Note: Major spoilers for the ending ahead.)įinally, after torturing his guests and letting the woman he sexually harassed stab him in the leg, chef Julian’s vision becomes painfully funny.

After almost two hours of being completely terrified - Ralph Fiennes is cold and chilling as chef Julian Slowik, an egomaniac driven to violence by his obsession with culinary perfection at his restaurant Hawthorne - I started laughing uncontrollably. As The Menu, director Mark Mylod’s chilling send-up of the world of exclusive fine dining, hurtled toward its dramatic ending, something in my brain broke.

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