I stumbled upon the movie Toast quite by accident. After buying the domain for my website, my searches for “movies on toast” kept directing me to this 2010-2011 film. With Helena Bonham Carter and Freddie Highmore (The Good Doctor) in the lead roles, I was surprised that I hadn't heard of it before. So, I decided to watch it and I'm glad I did.
The film is a biopic based on food writer Nigel Slater’s childhood memoir. Set in the 1960s, it chronicles young Nigel’s tumultuous relationship with food and family. Toast, a seemingly simple food, symbolizes Nigel’s early life: plain and unadventurous, much like his mother's limited cooking skills. It represents both comfort and the transformative power of food, reflecting Nigel’s journey from a boy coping with grief to a man defining his path through his passion for cooking.
The Food That Tells the Story
“It is impossible not to love someone who makes toast for you… Once the warm, salty butter has hit your tongue, you are smitten.”
While toast is a significant metaphor, the real culinary star is the lemon meringue pie. But let’s start with the beginning. "I'm Nigel, I'm nine years old and I've never had a vegetable that didn't come in a tin." Nigel’s journey with food begins with his mother’s hopeless cooking, boiling vegetables in their tins and burning dinner, leading to countless meals of toast.
Nigel’s passion for cooking shines through early on. When his father catches him reading under the blankets with a torch, it’s a cookery book he’s engrossed in rather than anything more racy. Nigel is particularly captivated by a recipe for spaghetti Bolognese, which he eagerly cooks for his parents. However, his mother won't even try it and makes herself some toast.
After his mother’s death, Nigel and his father survive on cheese on toast until Mrs. Potter enters their lives, winning Nigel's father's heart with her cooking. The rivalry between Nigel and Joan over his father’s affection culminates in a culinary battle.
There's a charming montage where she serves dish after dish, and by the end, Nigel has grown from a child into a teenager.
Nigel, the only boy who signed up for cooking classes, quickly becomes popular at school thanks to his culinary skills. His delicious creations, like homemade scones and cottage pies, win over his classmates and set him apart.
The competitive dynamic between Nigel and Mrs. Potter peaks when Nigel finally presents his father with a perfect lemon meringue pie, dad’s favorite dessert. Joan's reaction is both comical and telling:
"I do the lemon meringues around here."
She continues to assert her dominance in the kitchen with a tirade of culinary threats, all mispronounced:
"I'll cook boeuf bourguignon. Tomorrow we'll have duck à l'orange or should it be coq au vin? And then we'll have moules marinière. Oh yeah, I can do foreign muck as well, and that's just for starters. Quiches, tortes, omelettes, seafood soufflés, the bleeding lot. In fact, I think I'll just rustle up a tarte tatin, that's a caramelised apple pie in case you're wondering!"
Character Dynamics
Despite the film’s visual charm, the characters’ depth might leave some viewers wanting. The strained relationships, especially between Nigel and his father, are portrayed with a silent, stuttering realism that demands much from the viewer’s imagination. Helena Bonham Carter’s role as the glamorous yet intimidating stepmother, Mrs. Potter, is a highlight. Her complex character swings between attempts at bonding and outright threats, adding an intriguing layer to the family dynamics.
Cooking, to Get into the Role
In an interview with the Huffington Post in 2012, Freddie Highmore was asked if he is a good cook. The young actor explained that working on the film Toast made him realize how challenging it is to cook something fantastic. He always thought following a recipe would suffice, but he discovered that cooking requires a certain amount of skill and intuition. He shared that he and Helena Bonham Carter had a mock cook-off to get into character, where he attempted to follow a recipe for one of the lemon meringue pies. Despite carefully measuring and following the directions, his efforts didn’t quite succeed. The situation might be different today.
