In The Menu, Chef Julian Slowik crafted the perfect menu of delectable meals to entice and torture his guests, leaving some clues to his master plan along the way. The satirical thriller directed by Mark Mylod brings together a fascinating cast of characters as they are treated to an extra special dining experience at Slowik’s restaurant, Hawthorne, giving them a meal worth dying for. Slowik is a culinary genius who’s lost his ion for food and is seeking retribution on those he blames, played incredibly by Ralph Fiennes. As his courses unfold, the characters and audiences alike learn more of his backstory and how each of his guests affected his career.
The Menu recently debuted on HBO Max, opening up the opportunity to engage with this intriguing film. It’s quite unlike any horror film, favoring an examination of class structure and consumerism through food and story. The characters learn early on that no one will survive the night, so the mystery simply opens up to being about how everyone dies and why. As is the case with Slowik’s menu, his plan to murder these people and kill himself is intricate and meticulous. Only the arrival of Anya Taylor-Joy’s Margot disrupts his plans. She helps uncover what he’s got cooking, all of which can be surmised from these clues.
Leading The Goats To Slaughter
From the moment the guests arrived on Slowik’s island, they are met by his maître d’hôtel, Elsa, played Hong Chu - seen recently alongside Brendan Fraser in The Whale. She guides the newcomers on a brief tour of the facilities, showcasing how everything they will eat comes from the island. There’s a brief moment during this sequence when the group is ed by a few goats. In retrospect, it’s a clever way to signal that these people are practically livestock for the night’s endeavor. It’s interesting to see these hoity-toity guests who love to flaunt their wealth walking right next to some goats like they're part of the group.
These people aren’t actually on the menu for the night. Rather, it could be interpreted as Elsa leading the lambs, or in this case, goats to slaughter - although there is a possible cannibalistic twist later on in the Menu. Such an interpretation is only enhanced by the fact that Elsa takes them to the actual slaughterhouse to show them Hawthorne’s collection of meat. These people are the consumers, they take as Slowik likes to say. Yet, as somewhat unwilling participants in his special experience, their torture is a metaphorical feast for him and his cultish crew.
The Last Supper
With the exception of Margot, who cleverly manipulates her escape, this is literally these guests' last supper. However, this is a far more sinister affair than in the Bible. Aptly, there are twelve guests in attendance for the twelve apostles, though most of the colorful cast of The Menu wouldn’t look at Slowik as a messiah figure. Nevertheless, his employees certainly have, and they are eager and willing to share his bloody final dish. Their equally stoic and cold demeanor is haunting and proves that Slowik is somewhat of a cult leader, and despite his disillusionment, they still revere him - the same goes for Nicholas Hoult’s Tyler.
The Hawthorne’s staff's sheer devotion to Slowik is a frighteningly clear indicator that he was up to something nefarious, yet only Margot was able to notice early on. In another horror film that might mark her as the most important target, yet The Menu playfully flips certain horror tropes in her favor. Everyone else is so convinced they belong at the Hawthorne - whether for their status in the restaurant industry, devotion to food, relation to Slowik’s boss, and/or simply the amount of money in their wallet. Yet, they were all invited there for that one special meal, not even questioning the invitation.
A Breadless Bread Plate
With each course, Slowik and/or a sous-chef would detail the meal’s inspiration. One, in particular, sticks out for its clear signaling of Slowik’s plans. That would be the breadless bread plates, in which the guests are simply served the accompaniments without any bread. They are told that bread is for the commoners, and they are not commoners so they don’t get bread. The use of the food as such to highlight characters’ status as they missed Slowik’s point just goes to show how unique The Menu is in the scope of 2022 horror films. Had they understood what he was saying, perhaps their fates would’ve been different.
Some Broken Emulsion
The breadless bread plate is a subtle piece of torture as most of the guests are not used to being told no. Another related and juicy bit comes only moments later when food critic, Lillian, played by Janet McTeer, pretentiously complains about one of the accompaniments - an emulsion that has presumably broken, something she wouldn’t have expected from such a talented chef. In an interesting sign of aggression from Slowik, he has Elsa deliver a big bowl of the broken emulsion to Lillian. He couldn’t have foreseen such a mistake nor her critiques, yet it does demonstrate how he plans on treating his guests for the night.
The Tortillas
The most glaring food clue was definitely the tortillas. Everyone got specialized tortillas with incriminating or embarrassing images lasered on - everyone except Anya Taylor-Joy’s Margot. When Elsa said they specifically catered the menu to them, she wasn’t just speaking of flavors. Some of the tortilla’s implications are more obvious from the start, as in the case of the business-bros for their blatant embezzlement and Lillian for her involvement in the closing of beloved restaurants. Others are understandable as the film progresses, but all in all, the tortillas were an unexpectedly clever clue setting up why Slowik was doing what he was doing.
All The Theatrics
That night at the Hawthorne was more than a dining experience, it was a choreographed and theatrical production put on by Slowik and his staff. He was intent on curating a deliciously terrifying experience for his guests, and by the end of The Menu, he delivered. From the first death - remarkably, a sous-chef killing himself rather than a guest being a victim - and onward, Slowik’s plan unfolds like a particularly well-rehearsed play. All of the theatrics were clever ways to veil the glaring signs that things are not right at the Hawthorne.
After the first death, Lillian and her husband, Ted, believe it’s all a show for their benefit. Perhaps that’s more of them trying to convince themselves than them truly believing so, yet The Menu proved how inherently egotistical these people were. Intriguingly, Slowik did deviate from his grand scheme to put Tyler on display to humiliate him - a special scene in his cruel play. Even their moment of hope was all part of Slowik’s production when a cook posed as a Coast Guard Officer. Hope was never on the menu, and so when the time came, they all became willing participants in Slowik’s big show, roasting like s’mores.
