I love Toronto. I love that we have an entire building dedicated to the love of cinema. I love that on a beautiful Sunday afternoon, a small documentary called Jiro Dreams of Sushi was sold out and shown to a packed theater, as if it was the latest blockbuster. This film deserves all of the praise and hype it has been receiving, and then some. I feel grateful and indebted to David Gleb for directing this beautiful documentary.
Jiro Dreams of Sushi tells the story of world-renowned sushi chef, Jiro Ono. He is 85 years young, and has not stopped working for a day in his life. Despite being considered the best sushi chef alive, Jiro strongly believes there is still and always will be room for improvement. He is on an ongoing quest to reach the top, although he claims that no one really knows where the top even is. This is a film about following your bliss; finding your passion and pursuing it to the highest degree every single day. Jiro personifies these ideals. His amount of discipline, dedication, and drive are all astonishing and commendable traits. We could all learn from Jiro, which is why I have officially reclaimed the phrase “WWJD” to mean “What Would Jiro Do?” Start making the wristbands now!
The film itself follows Jiro and his two sons at the small ten seat restaurant, as they prepare sushi, serve customers, train apprentices, and choose only the best quality fish and rice. Jiro Dreams of Sushi is filmed as precisely as Jiro makes sushi. It is a perfect showcase of Jiro’s work because the film is made with as much passion for cinema as Jiro has for sushi. Many times throughout the documentary, Jiro mentions that the key to perfection is repetitiveness. To mirror this, Gleb shows Jiro plating different pieces of sushi over and over again over the course of the movie. His shots of the sushi are simply delectable. Never have I been so close to smelling and tasting food off a screen. It is a true testament to the beauty of both Jiro’s and Gleb’s work.
Accompanying the breathtaking cinematography, there is a soundtrack to die for. A food writer compares Jiro’s specialized menus to concertos in music. Most of the film is expertly paired with classical music, mostly played or composed by Philip Glass, another master in his field. Again, the passion of the classical music is another pitch-perfect manifestation of Jiro’s own passion. It also must be mentioned that the sounds of the kitchen are amplified, which adds another level of heightened sense and creates its own orchestra of utensils. Through the chopping, clanking, stirring, cooking, and cutting sounds, I felt as if I was right there in Jiro’s restaurant on the other side of the globe in Tokyo.
This is a must-see for the foodie, for the uninspired, for the cinephile, and for everyone in between. It is a tribute to a great chef, but it is also a tribute to the importance of finding one’s calling in life. I have a soft spot for documentaries, and I love them even more when it is a documentary I can recommend to my friends because it is so charming and lovely. Jiro Dreams of Sushi is one of those documentaries. The only downside to watching it is that you will never want to eat Toronto sushi again because you know, in your heart of hearts, that Jiro just wouldn’t approve of what’s on your plate.
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