A glorious portrait of a Japanese chef and his empire

The charm of a subject can take a documentary far. Such is the case with Matt Tyrnauer’s latest project, lettera luminous portrait of Nobu Matsuhisa. The Japanese chef is best known for his empire of luxury sushi restaurants (and, more recently, hotels) where guests can experience his fusion dishes inspired by his Japanese roots and early forays into Peruvian cuisine. exist letterAdapted from Matsuhisa’s memoir of the same name, “Tenauer” (also in Telluride this year) Cavill: Winning is everything, stupid man) connects the names and personalities of outstanding figures around the world.

letter This is a simple yet admirable portrait of its subject. The movie may appeal to fans of the chef (especially since this year marks the 30th anniversary of the first Nobu restaurant), but it may not fully satisfy culinary curiosity. Less process-oriented and broader in scope than David Gelb’s glossy document Jiro’s Sushi Dream, letter Looking at Matsuhisa as a person and a brand provides some biography and insight into the chef’s steadily growing empire.

tanner shape letter Built around a lengthy interview with Matsuhisa, Matsuhisa generously details his early years growing up in Japan, his desire to become a sushi chef, and the small successes and big failures of his early entrepreneurial ventures. These conversations, supplemented by interviews with Matsuhisa’s wife Yoko and his two daughters Junko and Yoshiko, form a relatively candid biography that reveals Matsuhisa’s personality. His humor — characterized by dad jokes and deadpan delivery — enlivens his storytelling and makes the first half of the documentary feel more intimate. Stories about Matsuhisa’s formative years reveal a childhood filled with premature grief and a fascination with sushi-making. He compares watching the chef delicately press the fish fillet onto the rice and serve it to the customer to watching actors on stage. For Matsuhisa, sushi is not just a delicacy, but also a performance.

When chefs talk about inspiration for popular dishes like black cod miso or kitchen experiments, letter Close to its full potential as a documentary. Anecdotes about Matsuhisa’s early years in Peru, where he first encountered cilantro, and restaurant ventures in Anchorage and later Los Angeles confirm the creative thread that underpins his multimillion-dollar business. These moments enrich the portrait, showing evidence of the artist’s tactics at work. That’s when we get to see genius firsthand, not just hear about it from various talking heads in the movie. In a striking moment near the end of the documentary, Nobu makes the rare decision to host close friends at his home in Japan. Here, the chef distills the theory of sushi-making as performance into action. As Matsuhisa arranges slices of saltwater eel onto plates, he regales his guests with jokes and stories about his early culinary career and his more recent experience as an international celebrity.

Matsuhisa has become a star. Tyrnauer contributed a large part letter Operating the business of a global conglomerate. With dozens of restaurants and several hotels around the world, Nobu has become a luxury item. Tyrnauer traveled with the chef (always privately, rarely commercially) to his various restaurants, particularly Nobu Los Cabos and Nobu London. He also attended a board meeting with Matsuhisa and his Nobu co-founders Robert De Niro and Meir Teper, where the three negotiated an expansion deal and a vision for the brand’s future. The filmmaking here is straightforward, more concerned with message delivery than stylistic score.

Each of Matsuhisa’s restaurants follows the Nobu approach – intimate luxury, quality food – while also using local ingredients to reflect cultural appetites. Tinard conducted interviews with writers such as Ruth Reichl and chefs such as Wolfgang Puck to help understand the impact chefs have had on the culinary world. Some of these clues are introduced and dropped quickly, in contrast to the steady pace of the biographical sections.

There’s so much substance and such an endearing sheen to this documentary that it largely sidesteps the underlying tension. When the corporate culture is described as family, questions about labor practices, including some recent lawsuits, go unresolved. The disagreement between De Niro and Tepper over the direction of the company—expanding quickly in pursuit of capital or moving slowly to maintain high standards—was observed but not assessed. It is for this reason letter Functions best as a primer and tasting menu for Nobu—the people and the brand.