Short films often act as a proof of concept made with the intention of expanding the project into a feature, whether it’sBoogie Nights,Whiplash,or more recently,Philip Barantini’sBoiling Point, the likes of which was expanded from a 22-minute short to a stunning 92-minute long take. Set at a high-end London restaurant around Christmas, the film shows how working in a restaurant is one of the most stressful jobs in existence, using its one-shot method to sell the stress of a single night’s work in the kitchen. Written from his own experiences working in kitchens for over 12 years, Barantini uses his past pf working tireless nights as fuel for both his story and his craft.
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What Is ‘Boiling Point’ About?
Boiling Point, both the short and the feature, walks barely over an hour in the shoes of Head Chef Andy Jones (Stephen Graham) as he spirals into a drug-induced meltdown when the tension (even in its shorter length) proves too much to bear. It’s not just the pressure of cooking a satisfactory meal, but a lowered hygiene rating, demands to increase worker’s wages, unprepared ingredients, and a bickering staff which all serve to increase the pressure until the gasoline tank is ready to burst. In increasing his long take marvel by a full 70 minutes, Barantini took considerable care to expand not just the technical elements of his breakthrough concept, but the thematic ones as well.
Stephen Graham Gives an Acting Masterclass in ‘Boiling Point’
Both the short and the feature ofBoiling Pointrequire Andy to be constantly on the go, with Stephen Graham appearing on the verge of breaking down throughout the entire film. In the original short, the camera is firmly rooted in Andy’s perspective, never allowing him to leave the frame. Though it’s easy to liken such a sustained performance to a piece of theater, the fact that Stephen Graham maintains focus with the camera close enough to study his every facial movement is a special class of acting altogether. Even screwing a long bottle cap on 17 minutes in comes with an enormous amount of pressure and the actor is able to channel every ounce of that relentless pressure into his performance.
As there are no scenes outside the kitchen, whether it’s the distance that this job has placed between him and his family or his crippling substance abuse, all of Andy’s traumas need to be conveyed through manic motions. He’ll repeatedly dodge or make brisk efforts for calls with his wife and son, with the short film climaxing on Andy’s emotional outburst as a result of the endless hours the Christmas season has taken away from him. In between, he takes constant swigs from a bottle that hides vodka and snorts lines of cocaine, every one of which, given the sustained nature of the long take, feels like one more jab at his health bar. It takes 5 minutes for Andy to actually reach his boiling point, but he just maintains it for 87 minutes more.
‘Boiling Point’ Shows Every Side of Kitchen Culture
In expanding to a feature, Barantini also expanded his cast and thus the thematic scope of the entire film. Outside the wider elements of tension that affect the whole kitchen, each character is given their own list of anxieties and traumas to keep at bay. An overworked dishwasher is pregnant (meanwhile her partner is two hours late), a waiter is harassed by a racist customer, and a manager is distraught by the dislike she inspires in people due to her lack of experience. With so many narrative drives in one place, the fact that the film moves in one take means that every action needs to be motivated by the characters at play. Even a dishwasher taking out the trash sees him scoring drugs. Rather than distracting from the action in the kitchen, it feeds into the tension upon his return.
Beyond dialing up the intensity, the added number of characters means that the other side of life in the kitchen is given a chance to shine. There’s a heartbreaking moment that occurs a third of the way through the feature in which one chef tries to roll up the sleeves of a younger colleague, only to find self-harm scars running all the way up his arm. He shies away mortified, only for her to hold him in a moment of tenderness desperately needed amidst the constant panic.Just like inThe Bear, we see the specific bond that comes from working so exhaustively and repeatedly every day, highlighting both the anxiety and passion of the restaurant world with the same stroke.
‘Boiling Point’ Is All About Appearances
One of the most frustrating aspects of the scenario ofBoiling Pointthat the characters repeatedly have to contain is the need to maintain their image. It’s not just the food that has to be great, the experience of fine dining itself has to seem both spotless and effortless, in spite of the mania behind closed doors. Even in the face of a short stock check, late staff members, and a general sense of dread at the start of the night’s performance, the restaurant’s manager insists the crew take a smiling selfie for the Instagram page. Things get worse when the crowds flock in as several Instagram influencers make a series of demands from off the menu, coupled with the added pressure of Andy’s pretentious old boss judgmentally surprising him. On top of that, Andy is forced to contain his drug and alcohol problem by consuming in his office where he routinely breaks down and cries.
Whether it’s the dishwasher picking up drugs, the younger chef’s self-harm, or Andy’s drug addiction, everyone has something they desperately need to hide, both from the customers and from each other. The camera reflects this through frenzied handheld jolts within the kitchen, only to instantly shift to tranquility when in the main dining room of the restaurant. The constant effort placed into maintaining this perfect front acts as the biggest contributor to the escalating tension on display. In both the short film and the feature, Andy makes a constant point of patronizingly telling those under him that they have no idea how much pressure he’s under, without actually telling any staff members what’s contributing to it. If that single hug between the younger chef and his older co-worker tells us anything, it’s that in environments as stressful as these, traumas need to be shared if they’re going to be overcome. While plenty of filmmakers have composed jaw-dropping long takes before, whether in a 22-minute short or a 92-minute feature, few have discovered a scenario that benefited from it as narratively and thematically as this one.
