Every non-white person has experienced the micro (and sometimes blatant) aggression that is depicted in La Cocina. Very early in our careers, we quickly have to learn how to navigate environments in which our inputs are disregarded, patience with our mistakes runs thin quicker than with other employees and we’re often held accountable for other people’s mistakes. This happens by the minute in The Grill, the restaurant in which Alonso Ruizpalacios’s (who also directed the excellent A Cop Movie) movie takes place.

As every The Bear fan will tell you, it’s never boring to watch the daily routine of a kitchen, and one of the reasons is because the events inside it play out almost like an action movie and things can quickly derail into horror if chefs, cooks and waiters mess up their parts of the job. This is one of the reasons why La Cocina works so well, and also the same reason why it sinks on its second half.

What is ‘La Cocina’ About?

We start out by following Estela (Anna Díaz), an undocumented woman who starts to work in a restaurant in New York. A true microcosm of the city, the kitchen of the restaurant features people from several backgrounds with several languages spoken at once, like a Babel tower. Estela arrives at The Grill at a critical moment: an internal investigation is being conducted to find out what happened with $800 that disappeared from the cash register.

La Cocina doesn’t only excel when showing the never-ending activity inside the kitchen of The Grill. Even though we’re used to seeing it by now, it doesn’t mean that it doesn’t take a lot of work to get it just right, and La Cocina does get it. Better than that, Ruizpalacios uses the rhythm of the kitchen to help viewers understand the dynamics and level of relationship between his characters.

But the movie is not only efficient at establishing character dynamics in the kitchen. In fact, La Cocina is at its best when it puts all (or most) of the characters in a room and lets them play off of each other in ways that advance the plot but are also extremely fun to watch. Early in the movie, Rooney Mara’s (Women Talking) character Julia is introduced in a locker room scene in which we quickly understand that these people have a cordial relationship inside the walls of The Grill but can quickly turn on each other if it means covering their own asses.

‘La Cocina’s Grave Mistake Hurts
Image via Willa

As a newcomer to that world, Estela has to keep up with both the dynamics of The Grill and the fact that most of her co-workers speak a language she doesn’t understand. In its first minutes, La Cocina makes us fully invested in the woman’s fate and how she will turn out, but then the movie makes its first grave mistake. After introducing a compelling character and a spectacular performance of Díaz, the movie basically forgets about her and moves on to less interesting characters.

It’s easy to see that La Cocina could be using Estela as a metaphor for how talented individuals can easily get lost in the crowd when they’re not Caucasion or male, but it’s hard not to feel robbed of Díaz’s talent when she disappears for most of the movie. It’s even more frustrating when you realize that La Cocina ditches Estela to focus on Pedro (Raúl Briones), an entitled cook with diva behavior that doesn’t have too much to offer in terms of backstory and motive.

Related The 10 Best Rooney Mara Movies, Ranked The award-winning actress is best known for her breakout role in The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo.

One could argue that Pedro’s behavior is disruptive because he’s choosing to act as a Caucasian man would, but the problem here is that La Cocina decides to go ways that severely downplay the engaging setting that it’s worked so hard to establish. At one point, Pedro just throws his body over the counter of another chef’s space in order to kiss a woman’s belly, which should completely disrupt the kitchen staff but everyone pretty much ignores it.

The same happens with other events throughout the movie. La Cocina establishes Lee Sellars’ (Tár) character as a severe boss who’s been in the culinary world for decades, but then allows him to succumb to peer pressure and stop the whole kitchen to sing a song during the the busiest hour of the day. Than that same boss tells Pedro off for making the kitchen stop later in the movie. These decisions end up hurting most of what we see in the first half of the movie, and it feels like all the more oneiric events are done in disregard to the kind of movie that was established in the first half.

‘La Cocina’s Ultimate Message Is Heard Loud and Clear
Image via Willa

Not that there is a problem La Cocina deciding to go down that road, but if you’re going to go big with theatricality, it helps to go all the way instead of just with a couple of scenes by the end of it. When we get to the end of its hefty runtime, we get the sensation that La Cocina tried to be several things — an investigative thriller, a fish-out-of-water drama, a delirious trip of a man who’s starting to get burnt out — and didn’t manage to take any of them all the way.

Fortunately, the answer to the money-stealing story is provided and ties up the knot of the initial themes that La Cocina proposes. With a simple solution, the movie communicates that, once again, minorities are expected to take accountability for their actions while people in a position of power act like they don’t owe their employees a tinge of respect. At least that message comes across loud and clear.

‘La Cocina’ starts out with strong performance and setting, but derails on its second half.Release Date October 25, 2024 Director Alonso Ruizpalacios Cast Raúl Briones , Rooney Mara , Anna Díaz , Motell Gyn Foster , Laura Gómez , Oded Fehr , James Waterston , Lee Sellars , Eduardo Olmos , Spenser Granese , Bernardo Velasco , Soundos Mosbah , Esteban Caicedo , Nebli Basani , José Luis Pérez , Gustavo Melgarejo Falconi Runtime 139 Minutes ProsAnna Díaz’s performance is worth the watch.The movie does an excellent job of establishing character dynamics.The real-time events inside the kitchen are always fun to watch.Does a good job in conveying what non-white professionals go through. ConsCompletely forgets its best actor (Diaz) pretty early into the movie.Focuses on the character with the least interesting storyline.The second half destroys the carefully constructed logic of the first.Inserts over-the-top elements way too late into the narrative. Expand

La Cocina, directed by Alonso Ruizpalacios, takes place during the bustling lunchtime rush at The Grill, a New York tourist hotspot. The story unfolds as missing money from the till prompts an investigation, with the workers being questioned amid the hectic environment.Release Date October 25, 2024 Director Alonso Ruizpalacios Cast Raúl Briones , Rooney Mara , Anna Díaz , Motell Gyn Foster , Laura Gómez , Oded Fehr , James Waterston , Lee Sellars , Eduardo Olmos , Spenser Granese , Bernardo Velasco , Soundos Mosbah , Esteban Caicedo , Nebli Basani , José Luis Pérez , Gustavo Melgarejo Falconi Runtime 139 Minutes Expand

La Cocina is now playing in theaters. Click below for showtimes.

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