Screened as part of NZIFF 2022

Flux Gourmet 2022

Directed by Peter Strickland

Cult favourite Peter Strickland channels Spinal Tap in this deliciously outlandish send-up of artistic pretension at an institute dedicated to the culinary arts. “A feast of hilarity and horror.” — Time Out

UK In English and Greek with English subtitles
111 minutes DCP

Rent

Director, Screenplay

Producers

Serena Armitage, Pietro Greppi

Cinematography

Tim Sidell

Editor

Mátyás Fekete

Production designer

Fletcher Jarvis

Costume designer

Saffron Cullane

Music

Tim Harrison

Cast

Asa Butterfield (Billy Rubin), Gwendoline Christie (Jan Stevens), Ariane Labed (Lamina Propria), Fatma Mohamed (Elle di Elle), Makis Papadimitriou (Stones), Richard Bremmer (Dr Glock), Leo Bill (technical assistant)

Festivals

Berlin, Sydney 2022

Elsewhere

“Absurdity is serious business in the films of Peter Strickland. The self-contained worlds in which his pictures unfold have always functioned according to their own singular, straight-faced logic and laws, guided by the twin forces of eccentricity and perversity. But even so, Flux Gourmet – an account of a month-long artistic residence by a collective of sonic caterers (no, really) – is a particular triumph. The funniest of his films to date, it’s a fully realised, immaculately tailored creation which conceals a slow-burning sense of mischief under its deliberate oddness and ornately deadpan dialogue.

Combining the aural obsession of Berberian Sound Studio with the exploratory psychosexual-kink rituals of The Duke Of Burgundy (NZIFF 2015), and nodding to the ominous power of fashion espoused by In Fabric (NZIFF2019), Flux Gourmet feels like a culmination of Strickland’s fascinations and themes to date. More so, when you learn that the director himself broke down the barriers between the edible and the audible as a member of The Sonic Catering Band, which created electronic music from the sound of cooking and preparing ingredients… With its delicious comic savagery and a magnificently bonkers, full-bore performance from Gwendoline Christie… the film’s unique personality comes from its meticulous design, in everything from costume to sound.” — Wendy Ide, Screendaily