It is pronounced "rah - mun" not "ray-men".
I must say I am rather surprised to see the low IMDb rating for this movie. It is much better and more entertaining than many recent rom-com releases rated higher. While it is a rom-com, it is a subtle one with a good message.
Brittany Murphy is Abby, in Tokyo with her working boyfriend. She has a menial job she hates, but being there with him makes it worthwhile. Until one day he tells her he is going to Osaka on business, and doesn't know if he will ever return. We quickly figure out he isn't coming back, but it takes Abby a few hundred unreturned messages left to his answering machine to come to that conclusion.
One fateful night, in the rain and hungry, she wanders into the local Ramen shop, they are closed, but since they don't understand English and Abby doesn't understand Japanese, she ends up being comforted with a bowl of Ramen and decides that she wants to learn to be a Ramen chef, apparently something unheard of there. But since she doesn't know that, and no one can tell her, she insinuates herself.
The old chef is veteran Japanese actor Toshiyuki Nishida as Maezumi. Immediately we see he is a very difficult man, but Abby is persistent. We learn that Maezumi has a son who didn't want to follow his father as a Ramen chef, and instead went off to Paris to study classical cooking. Maezumi was not happy about this, especially as other veteran Ramen chefs, preparing their own sons to succeed them, taunt him.
There are many small side stories, and the movie is fun, but the main theme is Abby trying to make her mark as a Ramen chef.
SPOILERS: Eventually Abby gets the old chef to teach her properly, but she likes to innovate. When the "master" comes to their neighborhood to taste her Ramen he likes it, but does not approve. However Abby has found herself, the movie ends one year later, in New York, with her running her own Ramen shop with innovative dishes. And we see a photo of the old chef and his wife with their son in France.
I must say I am rather surprised to see the low IMDb rating for this movie. It is much better and more entertaining than many recent rom-com releases rated higher. While it is a rom-com, it is a subtle one with a good message.
Brittany Murphy is Abby, in Tokyo with her working boyfriend. She has a menial job she hates, but being there with him makes it worthwhile. Until one day he tells her he is going to Osaka on business, and doesn't know if he will ever return. We quickly figure out he isn't coming back, but it takes Abby a few hundred unreturned messages left to his answering machine to come to that conclusion.
One fateful night, in the rain and hungry, she wanders into the local Ramen shop, they are closed, but since they don't understand English and Abby doesn't understand Japanese, she ends up being comforted with a bowl of Ramen and decides that she wants to learn to be a Ramen chef, apparently something unheard of there. But since she doesn't know that, and no one can tell her, she insinuates herself.
The old chef is veteran Japanese actor Toshiyuki Nishida as Maezumi. Immediately we see he is a very difficult man, but Abby is persistent. We learn that Maezumi has a son who didn't want to follow his father as a Ramen chef, and instead went off to Paris to study classical cooking. Maezumi was not happy about this, especially as other veteran Ramen chefs, preparing their own sons to succeed them, taunt him.
There are many small side stories, and the movie is fun, but the main theme is Abby trying to make her mark as a Ramen chef.
SPOILERS: Eventually Abby gets the old chef to teach her properly, but she likes to innovate. When the "master" comes to their neighborhood to taste her Ramen he likes it, but does not approve. However Abby has found herself, the movie ends one year later, in New York, with her running her own Ramen shop with innovative dishes. And we see a photo of the old chef and his wife with their son in France.