In Hollywood mythology, the perfectionist — more specifically, the perfectionist whose devotion to his or her craft excludes all the world's other putative delights — is a freak. From Cary Grant's paleontologist in Bringing Up Baby to Meryl Streep's editrix in The Devil Wears Prada, such characters, Hollywood tells us, need to get a life. And if the character is a woman, "needs to get a life" is often itself code for the more loutish formulation, "needs to get laid." That such a notion constitutes a particularly pernicious form of sexist tripe has never stopped Hollywood from promoting it. That No Reservations promotes it in a rather genteel fashion, and with a certain amount of misdirection, and with a largely engaging cast, makes the notion go down fairly easily. But you may hate yourself in the morning for swallowing it.
Adapted by screenwriter Carol Fuchs from the screenplay to the recent German import Mostly Martha and directed by Shine's Scott Hicks (who's dispensed with all of the hifalutin' ticks that made his Shine followup Snow Falling On Cedars so uniquely unwatchable, and settled into an easygoing by-the-book professionalism) No Reservations opens with master chef Kate (Zeta-Jones) describing the perfect way to prepare quails to a placid Balaban. Her speech is rhapsodic, erotic even, and the joke is that Balaban's playing her therapist. Food is Kate's life, all she wants to talk about, and her kitchen at a chic Greenwich Village restaurant is her sacrosanct domain. Granted, the restaurant's owner (Clarkson) would like Kate to lighten up, interact more with customers, and such — it's on her suggestion that Kate's in therapy — but Kate is not about niceties. In Kate's case, life isn't what happens when she's busy making other plans — her course is set, fixed. Does this really make her existence stagnant? Apparently. Stop asking questions, churl.
Life, as it were, comes at Kate in the forms of tragedy and seeming farce. First her beloved sister is killed in an auto accident, leaving Kate the guardian of her winsome niece Zoe (Breslin, of Little Miss Sunshine, who has shed her baby fat and is beginning to develop a disconcerting resemblance to Cillian Murphy). Then, while Kate's taking time to grieve and accommodate this little stranger, her kitchen is invaded by Nick (Eckhart), a brash, opera-loving sous-chef. Nick, of course, is here to accommodate the "needs to get laid" issue. But the misdirection I mentioned above is provided by Zoe, who takes to Nick far more easily than she takes to Kate, and whose need for a "real" family seems a substantial part of the engine that propels Nick and Kate's romance.
The kitchen action here is pretty diverting — everybody involved seems to have boned up on their Bourdain and Buford, and having done so, sanitized what they've gleaned with Hollywood polish. (There's a Mario-Batali-evoking shot of Nick wearing Crocs.) Indeed, by the end of the picture I was starving. Once one gets over Nick's initial obnoxiousness, Eckhart again proves himself a compelling romantic lead, awful haircut and all. And Zeta-Jones, as deglamourized as I imagine she's ever going to get, is convincing in both her exactitude and befuddlement, while Breslin proves herself a whiz at small gestures that speak of big emotions. Phillip Glass' score demonstrates that his mode of composition is in fact adaptable to the high-pedigree rom-com. All involved, in fact, hit their marks on the way to the picture's warm, fuzzy, complacent denouement.
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