Sticky, super sweet and messy as the remains of a smashed bottle of Cointreau, this comedy drama came out in its native France in 2022 and is only now making its way to the UK. But even those few years on the shelf have left it feeling uncomfortably out of touch with the urgency of the times when it comes to the way it handles the plight of young immigrants who facing increasing levels of hostility both in France itself and across the world with the rise of far-right activists.
In Kitchen Brigade’s universe, almost all a bunch of undocumented teenagers need to help them get leave to remain is a white-saviour lady; in this case it is chef Cathy (Audrey Lamy), who comes to work at a refugee centre after she abruptly quits her job at a prominent high-end restaurant. In care herself as a child, Cathy doesn’t like authority much it seems (unless she’s the one in charge), but she needs the work. The centre’s other two saintly white people, director Lorenzo (François Cluzet) and teacher Sabine (Chantal Neuwirth), guide Cathy to be more understanding of the hardship the (mostly) black kids have been through to make it to France. Soon, she’s teaching them how to chop shallots and man their stations in the French brigade system, which it’s worth pointing out is derived from military management systems and contains a kind of systematised structure of abuse.
The young actors who play Cathy’s charges (who are mostly from Africa) are charismatic performers, especially Yannick Kalombo as GusGus and Mamadou Koita as aspiring footballer Djibril, but they barely get more than a few lines and quick scenes to fill out their personalities, compared with the French characters. Then suddenly the film transitions into a meta commentary on TV reality shows as Cathy enters a competition, involving the boss she insulted when she quit her job at the start, to win a prize and get help setting up a certificate for teaching the kids. The whole thing is just a bit off, even though it’s hard to quarrel too much with the pro-immigrant message.