I didn't even know this movie existed a month ago. I went to the library to look for Kurosawa movies when I returned some books for my son. I found a couple, struck up a conversation with a librarian checking out, and she recommended this and immediately reserved it for me with me barely saying a word. Now I'm thankful. The movie finally came in and I decided to watch it last night. As it turns out, I randomly happened into the best food movie I've ever seen. Defined, with tongue in cheek, as a "noodle Western," Tampopo is the protagonist, a woman running a small ramen shop. One night by chance the male lead Goro enters her restaurant and from there the journey begins to become the best restaurant in Japan. The movie is mostly different flavors of comedy and a love of food, with unrelated, small, food related sequences randomly interspersed to break up the main timeline, including a grocery store manager trying to catch a food squeezer in the act, a white suited gangster who happens to be a serious lover of food and women as he provides the food filled sex scenes, among others. This movie is hard to describe. But it's truly great. It has genuine humor, it's genuinely interesting, and the main character and story are endlessly charming. Roger Ebert gave this movie a perfect rating, and who am I to disagree.

A slice-of-life with splices of smaller slices of other lives between slices. Really fun and well-paced. Can become quite spontaneously bizarre and awkward, especially the lingering shot during the credits. Doesn't feel very '80s until it explicitly reminds you. Worth a watch, definitely belongs at the top of an extremely specific Japanese subgenre where nothing very exciting happens, but is presented in a way that is still captivating, which seems to have become a staple of Japanese cinema.

This was my first Japanese comedy movie, had no idea what I was getting myself into, it was super confusing at times, but not in a bad way. Very funny, and wholesome.

Really sweet, fun, and delicious. I wasn't quite as taken with it as I had hoped, I think because the gender imbalance felt a little uncomfortable. On reflection, it makes more sense when viewed as a "western" though, and I did like the sweet veneration of a good bowl of noodles.

Don’t watch this on an empty stomach. As a film almost completely comprised of food lovers, passionately discussing and/or enjoying their meals, _Tampopo_ is an experience destined to flare the appetite. It’s also a sweet-and-sour mix of warm camaraderie and offbeat Japanese humor. In the primary story, a pair of roaming late-night truck drivers stumble upon a tiny noodle shack and help its proprietor (a widowed mother) understand the difference between mediocre ramen and something more extraordinary. Sprinkled at various points in the narrative, like so many packets of herbs and spices, are a string of unrelated asides. Little comical snippets which interpret everything from western dining etiquette to romantic bedroom buffets through a twisted carnival mirror. The ramen shop’s tale is simple, earnest and lovely. A pair of kind-hearted strangers befriend a down-on-her-luck entrepreneur, show her what she’s doing wrong, sample (or steal from) the competition, gather a team of so-called experts, and persevere. There’s a looseness to this relationship that makes it feel real and natural; they sneak and cheat, mingle with pariahs, stumble and fall, but their goal is noble and their upbeat attitude, even during times of hardship, is light, honest and attractive. The owner may look up to her masters with awe and wonder, but their only real mastery is of self-ordained variety. They’ve bellied up to a lot of noodle bars over the years and know how to distinguish a good one from the litany of pretenders. _Tampopo_'s smaller, less consequential interstitials are more of a one-note type. Disconnected ruminations with just a single heavy punchline to their name. These eventually lose their charm and grow into unwelcome distractions, but for roughly the first hour, they make for an entertaining (and often deliciously absurd) series of sidetracks. Not every dish needs to be complicated to have merit. The same holds true for _Tampopo_. Although the plot may repeat a few beats, its base recipe is fundamentally sound, with high-quality ingredients and a strong finish. A rich, filling dose of feel-good soul food, even if its side dish choices are sometimes a little puzzling.