There are any number of scenes in The Godfather where the characters are eating, but two stand out: the one where younger Michael goes to the meeting and the more seasoned mafiosi steer him into a kitchen full of delicious-looking pasta, meatballs, sausages, simmering sauce, and tell him something like “You never know when you’ll have to cook for 15 or 20 guys!”
The other, more recognizable choice, is the scene in the Italian restaurant where Michael goes to the bathroom to retrieve the gun from behind the toilet, and returns to dinner and assassinates the corrupt police captain (McClosky) and rival boss (Solozzo?).
When Hillary Swank’s character Maggie is waiting tables, she surreptitiously slips a half-eaten T-bone into a napkin. Back at home we see her making a meal by gnawing at the bone while she counts her tips and saves her money.
Then there’s the scene at the diner after Maggie and Frankie (Eastwood) go to visit Hillary’s family for the first time. Frankie wants to go to a place where they make good lemon meringue pie. We see him savoring the pie, then musing about how much it would cost to buy a diner like this one. The pie and the diner represent the stable domestic life he’s never had. (At least that’s the way I read it.) (At the end of the movie, he buys the diner, IIRC.)
Nice one – in addition, two more Bunuel films might fit the bill: “The Exterminating Angel,” in which the company eats their meal but then never gets to leave, and “Viridiana,” with a legendary debauched food fight among some vagrants who have been taken in by a charitable woman (IIRC).
How about “Silence of the Lambs,” “Hannibal,” and “Alive”? “Food,” in a loose sense of the term, certainly plays a critical part in all of those movies…!
One good one not mentioned is “Sling Blade”, a major recurring theme in the movie is Carl’s fondness for biscuits with mustard, though now i think about its theres lots of food scenes of significance - the first thing Carl does out in the real world is order fast food, (great scene), Carl and the kid bond over a can of potted meat, and many other important scenes centered around food and eating in general
Alive is on the list in the OP; it works very, very well as a discussion starter. Hannibal has been done, too – usually the brain scene at the end. Should have added that to the list.
Reminder – just having food present in the scene isn’t enough. The food or eating has to be essential to the scene.
This is PERFECT – exactly the kind of thing I’m looking for.
Again, thanks to all for suggestions. I’ll check back in on Monday.
Oh and there’s the scene in The Aviator where Howard Hughes goes to see Juan Trippe (Alec Baldwin) for a negotiation over a meal. Trippe serves Hughes fish (knowing he doesn’t like fish). Howard forces it down. Trippe serves Hughes water in a glass with a visible thumb print on it, messing with Hughes’s obsessions with germs and cleanliness. The food represents Trippe’s power, and Hughes’s determination to fight it.
Or how about Clue (gives the background of all the guests)? Or Rocky Horror Picture Show (backstory and final disposition of Eddie)? Or Attack of the Killer Tomatos (The “Pass the Ketchup scene”)?
In The Matrix, if I recall correctly, the character who turns traitor gets treated to a steak dinner. The steak represents the comforting lie that is life in the Matrix. (Back in reality, the only food is porridge.)
In 28 Days Later, the military group cooks a special meal for the new arrivals. But the food turns out to be rancid, our symbolic warning that there’s something rotten about this military outpost.
In Along Came Polly, Ben Stiller and Jennifer Anniston go out for Indian food. Stiller is a cautious man with a sensitive stomach and normally only eats bland food. By dating free spirit Polly, he is adding spice (and an element of risk) to his life. (The experiment with Indian food doesn’t go well, though.)
It is also the most beautiful, delicious-looking steak I’ve ever seen in a film or TV show. If you have the DVD, find that scene – it makes my mouth water every time I watch the movie, just looking at that perfect steak.
That remind me, FLCL (not a movie, but a 6 episode long animated series that is short enough to watch like one) has a lot of themes involving food, particularly comparing the two romantic interests of Naota, the main character. Mamimi buys day-old ends of bread from the father because that’s all she can afford, and drinks sickeningly sweet sodas, while Haruko, the hyperactive guitar-swinging “Vespa Girl”, eats excessively spicy curries.
To be honest, FLCL is a rather difficult show to follow (I don’t think the guy who MADE it knows what the hell it’s about) but it’s lots of crazy fun to watch. The best explanation I’ve ever been able to come up with is that the show is about moving outside of your comfort zone, ie: drinking the sickening sweet sodas or eating the flamingly-spicy curry, in order to better grow as a person.
Of course, the show might also just be about crazy chicks on scooters who assault you with Fender guitars.
As far as The Godfather goes, an argument could be made that McClusky, chowing down on the veal while a discussion that he can’t possibly understand between the two Mafiosos goes on, is a demonstration of the decadence and corruption of the police force in New York that helps the war between Corleone and Tataglia get so badly out of hand, with the police taking bribes and looking the other way while the mafiosos escalate against eachother until it’s impossible for them to regain control, ie: Micheal shooting McClusky dead while his mouth is full of delicious veal.
Also, lots of folks see a theme of characters eating oranges and later being killed or dying, which could have all sorts of fun potential deep discussions. One fun path I’ve taken down this train of thought is that the oranges could refer to the Fruit of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden, the eating of which lead to Adam and Eve being banished from the Garden of Eden and doomed to mortality.
Oh, there’s a scene in Iron Eagle where Doug and Chappie plan an air raid using, at first, Italian food on a plate as an ad-hoc map, with different pieces of food representing terrain and targets and such. Later on, they make a larger map using a tabletop and various objects from Chappie’s garage. Both times a stray object on the map is mistaken by Doug for something important, and Chappie removes it (first a pepperoni that Chappie eats, and then his lunchbox). During the final mission, Chappie is shot down, and Doug has to make his own decisions for the rest of the mission, perhaps representing how a child needs to learn to stop seeking his direction from his elders, becuase one day the elders will be gone and he has to fend for himself? (yeah, I know, I’m seriously reaching here given that the movie was basically a vehicle for a cool Queen music video involving Mirage jets and F-16s)
How about “Silence of the Lambs”? A story about a cannibal. His famous line…two if you count the last line in the movie. And Clarices’ memory. All of which have to do with eating as not just killing but devouring and obliterating.
Or “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane”, the rat scene. Food as control.
Patch Adams (played by Robin Williams) learns from a previous conversation that one of the elderly patients had a fantasy (Non sexual) about being in a pool of sphaghetti (or however you spell it) later in the film, Patch Adams goes out of his way to bring the sphagetti, pool, and patient together.
In Avalon a rift develops between two branches of a family because one of them doesn’t wait for the other to arrive before carving the Thanksgiving turkey.
Chan Is Missing has a number of important scenes involving food, including a conversation with a cook in a Chinese restaurant where he complains about the types of food that non-Chinese people order.
A running gag in Fargo is that Marge Gunderson, the pregnant police chief, is shown eating constantly. There’s a scene where she’s at a buffet and it’s a surprise when she actually passes up one of the steam table items. All of the food she eats is pedestrian fare - a hotel restaurant is upscale for her. Food is just one of the ways the movie pokes fun at the squareness of the main characters.
