We love us some Anthony Bourdain, but we’ve gotta say this: the list of his five favorite foodie films that he offered up to Entertainment Weekly is about as spontaneous as a Domino’s Pizza delivery capping off a long night of weed smoking. Yes, Big Night, of course. And Eat Drink Man Woman, yawn. In Bourdain’s defense, we couldn’t think up that many other ones — maybe there just aren’t that many rhapsodically hunger-inducing movies. More often than not, movies use food for a more insidious reason: to gross us out. So we’ve compiled something of a reverse to the Bourdain list — ten movies that put us off of the foodstuffs in question. Take a look (hopefully on an empty stomach) after the jump.
Eggs, Cool Hand Luke
Granted, hard-boiled eggs are something of an acquired taste to begin with — we tend to prefer ours deviled or scrambled. But you’ll never want another hard-boiled egg to cross your lips after the famous sequence in Cool Hand Luke that finds Paul Newman’s title character downing 50 eggs in one hour, to the delight and disgust of his fellow prisoners, who engage in some spirited wagering over whether he can achieve the ridiculous goal — with, of course, “no throwin’ up.” (Honorable mention to the raw-egg breakfast in Rocky.)
French toast, Road Trip
And while we’re dispensing with breakfast items, we should probably toss out French toast as well after watching this scene from Todd Phillips’s 2000 comedy, which just goes to show that, no matter what, you never, never send anything back — especially when your waiter is Horatio Sanz.
Caviar, Big
The joke is that since Josh Baskin (Tom Hanks) is really a pre-teen in a grown man’s body, he can’t appreciate the fine flavor of Beluga caviar. Or maybe it’s that he’s young enough that he hasn’t yet learned to pretend to like things that are gross just because they’re ridiculously expensive. Either way, the first time we tried caviar, our response was about the same as his (seen at 2:03 in the trailer above).
Green pea soup, The Exorcist
Here’s a case where a little bit of behind-the-scenes information has done big-time damage to an undeserving culinary item. The “green pea soup” scene in The Exorcist is not, of course, actually about green pea soup — that’s just what they used for the scene, in which possessed Regan projectile-vomits on Father Karras. But now everyone knows that, so good luck having a bowl without thinking of Satan’s spew.
Mashed potatoes, Animal House
One of the great things about the cinema is how it creates connotations: Once we see an idea or an image connected via film to a piece of music or an everyday object, that connection is soldered in our brains forever. And so, once John Belushi’s Bluto Blutarsky stuffed his cheeks full of mashed potatoes and enacted the popping of a zit, well, that association was forged forevermore.
Blueberry pie, Stand By Me
This one remains a stomach-churner. Your author has what could politely be referred to as a bit of a gag reflex; the sight, sound, or smell of someone else tossing their cookies has a tendency to prompt us to do the same. So we’ll ask your forgiveness for the lack of penetrating insight on this clip — we’re going off memory here. But we recall that there was vomiting. Lots and lots and lots of vomiting.
Apple pie, American Pie
We don’t have any hard data on apple pie sales figures, but we’re curious as to whether they took a dip in the months following the 1999 release of American Pie, the gross-out comedy with the notorious pie-copulation set piece. On the other hand, apple pie sales might have spiked for a certain, ahem, segment of the population…
Butter, Last Tango in Paris
Hoo boy, how do we do this one delicately? Um, well, there’s this movie, Last Tango in Paris. There’s quite a little bit of sex in it. And in this one scene… oh dear. Yep. Okay. If you don’t know about the butter scene, we’re not quite sure how to tell you. But it’s above. And it’s NSFW. Really, really, a lot NSFW.
Dumplings, Three… Extremes
As long as we’re riding the discomfort train, let us briefly (oh so briefly) mention “Dumplings,” which began as a segment of the horror triptych Three… Extremes and was then expanded to become a feature of its own. It tells the charming tale of Aunt Mei, whose special dumplings have a strikingly rejuvenating quality, probably since she makes them out of… oh, blergh. We’ll leave it unsaid and go be sick.
“Wafer-thin mint,” Monty Python’s the Meaning of Life
Monty Python’s the Meaning of Life was the British comedy troupe’s final feature film collaboration, and they decided to go out with a bang — literally. One of the final sequences, “Part VI: The Autumn Years,” introduces us to Mr. Creosote (Terry Jones), a monstrously overweight diner at a swanky restaurant, who eats and vomits in something of a continuous circle of life. But when the maître d’ (John Cleese) plies him with a “wafer-thin mint,” it’s too much for our Mr. Creosote.
Those are our grossest movie food scenes — which ones turned your stomach?