Chef Chidambara movie review: Comedy that seems more fun given the current affairs in Kannada cinema

2.5/5

Chef Chidambara movie story: Chidambara (Aniruddha Jatkar) is an award-winning chef, but his culinary prowess has not helped him keep his family business afloat. His beach-side restaurant has been pledged with local money shark Avinash (KS Sridhar), who’s threatening to take it away. Chidambara’s girlfriend Anu (Rachel David) is hopeful of getting him out of his money troubles, once her entrepreneurial dream takes wing.

There’s an easier way out, though. Chidambara just needs to help Avinash’s wife Mona (Nidhi Subbaiah) deal with a former flame, who’s threatening to expose their fling to her husband. All that Chidambara has to do is to ensure that this ex hands over all the explicit material he has of her. But then, the guy ends up dead in Chidambara’s apartment, which sets in motion a series of events including mobile phones and disposal of bodies.

Chef Chidambara movie review: For a film called Chef Chidambara, that had leading man Aniruddha Jatkar supposedly learn to chop vegetables and pick up cooking skills, there is literally no cooking he does. His skills are more olfactory, you see. He will stir a massive cauldron or toss a wok, but his prowess as a chef is to take a big whiff of steaming hot food and look immensely pleased with himself. In fact, the protagonist being a chef has no bearing on the narrative; he could have had any other profession and the end result would have been the same. And that is because Chef Chidambara is a comedy of errors about getting rid of dead bodies.

Chef Chidambara trailer: Aniruddha Jatkar leads dark comedy thriller about a dead body 

As far as the plot goes, director M Anand Raj sticks to a simple formula and doesn’t burden his audience with too much information. Like, for instance, the fact that Chidambara can afford to live in a swanky apartment, but is debt-ridden – no explanation is offered; it is what it is. No surprises in how Chidambara’s efforts to keep a dead body out of sight from visitor goes. It is when he is saddled with a second body that you may just let out an involuntary chuckle – the dead guy has sustained a blow to his genitals and the perpetrator needs to dump the body in a secluded area. Sounds familiar?

The rest of the film follows how Chidambara extricates himself from this mess and if he is able to save his restaurant. Aniruddha is effective as Chidambara, although having the 50-year-old actor playing an unmarried youngster, who is then paired with an actress almost half his age, feels a bit of a stretch. Nidhi Subbaiah gets the better role and the actress has fun with it. Love Mocktail fame Rachel, as the love interest, is limited by the scope of the role.

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Chef Chidambara movie verdict: Chef Chidambara is a moderately fun, breezy watch, even though it does not have many laugh-out-loud moments. It helps that it is just over an hour and a half in length.