Umbrellas can\'t save this rec center.

Short Order is opening in limited release this weekend, but not nearly limited enough. Why am I so ticked at this movie? Because of the official synopsis, that’s why. I put it after the jump (because it’s that damn long). It’s the most pretentious thing I’ve read since this M. Night Shyamalan interview.

I read the entire synopsis and I still have no idea what this movie is about. I just know that it contains a "cigarrillo smoking Felix" and "the mystery and majesty and magic of existence".

No sir, I don’t like it.  – RoboPanda

Food’s up! It’s another night on earth, friends, and up there in space, in the company of the satellites and telecom hardware your host Lenny Green of the Radio World Broadcasting Network sends deep thoughts and musical moments through the misty blue of our delicate planet and eavesdrops on a magical night in the lives of our protagonists: Short Order Chefs, Masterchefs, Delivery People, working out their philosophies between bites of honest to goodness, Onions, Mustard Hot Dogs, Garlic studded, Lemon and Rum drenched prawns, house special Osso Bucco (featuring the freshly chopped fingers of Bill Dodging Customers).

Will Paulo, the proprietor of The Mediterraneo get his revenge on the infamous Bill Dodger, the elusive globe-trotting check-evader who has caused a worldwide epidemic of people running out on their restaurant bills thereby threatening the livelihood of him and all of the other brave souls who slave over a hot griddle? Or will he expire before then, fulfilling his last wish of (literally) making a meal of himself, of returning his body whence it came: back into the food chain?

Or, indeed, will his loyal sous chef Pedro kill a respected food critic who is already choking to death on a finger bone – with a medium sized saute pan and (literally) ruin everything?

Will Fiona, the Short Order Chef at Ishmaels , – whose vivid imagination can transform the most dreary street into an all singing all dancing musical revue as she wrestles with the vagaries of life – rekindle her passion for real cooking, a gift so intense that it can, and does, cause orgasms. And will she redeem herself from the cul de sac of misery and confusion on whose end wall she daily bloodies and bruises her beautiful mind?

Will Catherine, the Ishmael delivery girl find meaning in the company of a Russian prostitute; or will the force of her wonderful honest and funny self get her the chat show she so richly deserves? Will she stop taking photos of all the people she delivers food to; or will she get what she really, really wants – a kiss from someone close to her?

Or will the cigarrillo smoking Felix free Fiona from her frustration and seduce her back to the fancy kitchens of Shanks , his high street eaterie?

Will the philosophical musings of short order chefs from around the world regarding pizza dough and female orgasms, omelettes and maidenhead larceny, hot dogs and sexual frustration in American women during the war years shed any light on God’s plan?

On Planet Earth on any given night, a billion stories unfold describing with their arc the mystery and majesty and magic of existence. And what better metaphor than food can describe the poetry of life in all its forms. Join me, Lenny Green, in the rollicking, exasperating, hilarious, sensuous, violent, intoxicating, wondrous lives of these precious few, the heroes of the hot plate, the brave pulsing hearts who live and die by the frying pan.

Food’s up, my friends. Enjoy. Because Life is a Buffet… 

Jesus.