Delicious (2025)

Directed by Nele Mueller-Stöfen, it tells the story of a seemingly happy family, with a successful mother (Valerie Pachner) and a father who seems to be hiding things (Fahri Yardim).

Their children (Nalia Schuberth and Caspar Hoffmann) travel with them. They usually live in Germany, but move on holiday to France, where a spectacular residence awaits them, reflecting their social position and, incidentally, the looks of those who work in the nearby hotels.

Among them are a group of waiters and cleaners, who seem to devise a plan for one of them (Carla Díaz) to become part of their family as a caretaker, cook, etc., to the point of becoming important within the family. The seed is planted.

The film is slow and moves at a cautious pace as the viewer waits for the script to explode and things to happen, but this doesn't happen and gradually the interest is lost. Somehow, the family begins to break up.

We have the mother of the family making a series of questionable decisions who, preceded by a boring and troubled marriage and the stress of her job, decides to reclaim her lost youth.

On the other hand, we have a father who is running away from his job, a daughter who is ignored and a son in full adolescence, searching for boundaries.

All of this makes the cleaning lady become a figure of reference, who little by little eats their toast, never better said, and gradually involves the rest of her workmates. Let's say it's something like a German-style Parasites, but it doesn't quite get off the ground.

The performances and the cinematography are two positive aspects of the film. The script is the one that has some inconsistencies. But I don't want to dwell on these technical aspects on which I am not an expert.

Rather, I would like to focus on other aspects of the background, those that underlie the interior of the work, which seem to me to be the most important and which I will tell you about in spoilers.

In short, it's a slow thriller, which seems to have an interesting premise, but it doesn't run as smoothly as one would have liked.