North American Premiere
1885: “The Napoleon of the culinary arts,” Dodin Bouffaunt (Benoit Magimel) is the most renowned gourmand in France, although he would be the first to credit his beloved cook, Eugénie (Juliette Binoche), who makes even his most whimsical conceits sing. Their partnership runs deep; it’s practical, intimate, intuitive, romantic… He’s asked her to marry him many times, she always demurs. But they’re both getting older, perhaps it is time to try again…Thirty years after his debut feature The Scent of Green Papaya won the Camera d’or at Cannes, Tran Anh Hùng won the Best Director prize at this year’s festival with another delectable movie destined to join Babette’s Feast, Chocolat and Big Night on those lists of great foodie films. The Pot-au-Feu is so beautifully composed you can almost taste it: the mise-en-scene evokes Impressionist paintings, but the camera is agile and alive to the energy and dynamics of the kitchen. And for all its attention to process, the film reveals that this is itself a sublime consummation.
Best Director, Cannes 2023
Media Partner
Juliette Binoche, Benoit Magimel, Emmanuel Salinger, Patrick D’assumçao, Galatea Bellugi
France
2023
Special Presentations
In French with English subtitles
Book Tickets
Indigenous & Community Access
Indigenous Access Tickets Community Access Tickets Ticket Donation Requests
Credits
Executive Producer
Christine De Jekel
Producer
Olivier Delbosc
Screenwriter
Anh Hung Tran
Cinematography
Johnathan Ricqueboug
Editor
Mario Battistel
Production Design
Toma Baqueni
Director
Tran Anh Hùng
Tran Anh Hùng was born in Vietnam in 1962 but educated in France. His first film, The Scent of Green Papaya (1993) explored the relationship between a cook and the master who falls in love with her. The film won the Camera d’Or at Cannes and established Tran on the art-house circuit. Cyclo in 1995 won the Golden Lion at Venice, and The Vertical Ray of the Sun in 2000 was also well-received. In 2010 he adapted Haruki Murakami’s novel Norwegian Wood for the screen. For his latest film, The Pot-au-feu, he won the Best Director prize at Cannes.
Filmography: The Scent of Green Papaya (1993); Cyclo (1995); The Vertical Ray of the Sun (2000); Norwegian Wood (2010)
Missing VIFF? Check out what's playing at the VIFF Centre
Clan of the Painted Lady + Q&A
Jennifer Chiu's engrossing documentary explores the Hakka — a people, a language, and a culture that have been obscured for far too long. Tracing her own lineage back from Canada to China, the director creates an illuminating, bravely personal film.
Fiume o Morte!
The Croatian city of Rijeka rediscovers its own past in this delightfully unconventional hybrid documentary about Italian poet and proto-fascist Gabriele D’Annunzio, who seized the city known in Italian as Fiume in 1919.
Silent Friend
In this entrancing reverie from On Body and Soul director Ildikó Enyedi, we are invited to contemplate several human specimens from the vantage point of a mighty Ginkgo biloba tree on the grounds of a German university.
At the Place of Ghosts
In this supernatural Indigenous thriller from the director of Wildhood, siblings Mise'l and Antle journey into Sk+te'kmujue'katik (the Place of Ghosts), a primordial forest that exists outside of time, to confront their violent upbringing.
Bushido
An impeccable samurai (and "Go" expert), Kakunoshin is framed for a crime and forced into exile. Years later he stumbles across the true reason for his fall from grace, and sets about exacting his revenge...