Boiling Point movie review: out of the frying pan…

There have been one-take movies before, but perhaps none has felt less gimmicky than Boiling Point, which captures the — heh — pressure-cooker environment of a restaurant kitchen with enthralling verve and insistence. This is a movie I could not look away from, which has been a rare thing in a year when I’ve mostly been watching movies at home, with all its attendant distractions. And I sure as hell will never approach going out for a meal with the same oblivious insouciance after this.

It’s an electrifying work of high-wire cinematic theater as the always brilliant Stephen Graham (Greyhound, Rocketman) has a glorious uncut 90-minute meltdown as Andy Jones, head chef and part owner at a trendy restaurant in hip Dalston, in east London. It’s the busiest day of the year for any UK restaurant — the Friday before Christmas — which would be stressful enough if he were at his best, but Andy is dealing with some personal shit, too. Like, a lot of personal shit. Not least with the unexpected appearance for dinner of his best frenemy, the celebrity chef he used to work for (Jason Flemyng: Military Wives, I Give It a Year), accompanied by a notorious restaurant critic (Lourdes Faberes: No Time to Die, State of Play). A good review from her could send Andy’s business to the next level… which he really needs.

It’s an unexpectedly nail-biting thrill see how Andy and his team — led by a wonderfully flinty Vinette Robinson (Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Morgan) as sous chef Carly — get yummy and interesting food onto plates fast in the face of everything from a persnickety health inspector and a waitress who’s running late (she’s an aspiring actor who snuck off to an audition) to racist, know-it-all wine jerks and obnoxious Instagram influencers who demand to order off-menu.

Writer (with James Cummings) and director Philip Barantini, who has experience in restaurant kitchens, is expanding his 2019 BAFTA-nominated short of the same name. (Watch it on Amazon Prime in the US and UK and on Apple TV globally.) The result is almost documentary-esque but even more immediate, for what we see here genuinely was shot all in a single go — there are no hidden edits. Form and function are one, the medium amplifying the message: that the nonstop stress of paying customers waiting to be shown a nice evening out is both the heaven and the hell of this work.

The urgency the film oozes was surely compressed and compounded by the coronavirus pandemic that loomed over the production: an already intense shooting schedule was halved, from four days to two, in order to finish before London locked down in March 2020. (This was apparently the very last film to wrap in the city before we all started hunkering down.) And so this ends up a riveting snapshot of a moment in time in more ways than one.

Boiling Point is one of the best films I’ve seen this year, one that is all the more exhilarating for its smallness: this is not only a one-take wonder but one-location one as well. (It was shot at a real restaurant, Jones & Sons, which looks terrific; I’m now dying to check out.) Somehow, Barantini and Graham and the rest of the incredible cast render the film simultaneously intimate and explosive. I’m still marveling at how they pulled it off.