Anthony Bourdain made the necessary act of feeding ourselves feel like a rock ’n’ roll philosophy, a radical form of communication that could obliterate all boundaries of language, culture, and class. His suicide in 2018 was, therefore, particularly hard. For many, he’d become an emblem of what it means to live with an open heart and an open mind.
Matt Johnson’s Bourdain biopic film Tony – which casts The Holdovers breakout Dominic Sessa as the chef, author, and documentarian in early adulthood, on the cusp of brilliance – uses the coming-of-age narrative to capture that recognisably Bourdain-esque sense of culinary revelation. As a film about what it means to embrace what’s in front of you and not what’s in your mind, it’s a lovely and deeply likeable work.
