SCOTT Hicks’s romantic drama serves up a tantalising New York twist on the award-winning German film Mostly Martha.
The script lacks the delicate flavours of the original, and the tone has been sweetened excessively to suit American palates. However, No Reservations is seasoned with enough comedy to make the heroine’s metamorphosis from self-obsessed ice maiden to kind-hearted mother easy to swallow, if not comfortably digest.
Kate Armstrong (Zeta-Jones) is a perfectionist, who has devoted the best years of her life to establishing 22 Bleecker as one of the most fashionable restaurants in Manhattan.
Kate’s carefully ordered world turns sour when her sister Christine is killed in a car accident, leaving behind nine-year-old daughter Zoe (Breslin).
Kate struggles to contend with surrogate parenthood, while working unsociable hours, and temperatures rise even further with the arrival of fun-loving chef Nick (Eckhart), whose laissez faire attitude to cooking slowly, but surely thaws Kate’s heart, and helps to build bridges with Zoe.
Verdict: No Reservations would struggle to earn a single Michelin star for originality or sophistication, but the various plot strands simmer pleasantly. Zeta-Jones looks comfortable in her pristine chef’s whites and Eckhart makes the most of his undernourished charmer, but it’s Breslin who once again steals the film as the orphan. The onscreen chemistry may never quite come to the boil, but No Reservations delivers no-frills home cooking.
