Take a quaint European-looking restaurant in a quiet Hokkaido town in the dead of winter. Add quirky regulars who are treated to nightly disquisitions, philosophical and otherwise, by the avuncular owner of a local hat shop. Toss in scrumptious- looking "set menus" of steaks, croquettes and other Western- style comfort food.
Does this sound like a recipe for another heart-warming Japanese film on good cooking and life's Big Problems, with the latter solved by the former?
Partly, but director Tetsuo Shinohara ("Manatsu no Orion," "Metro ni Notte") gives this by-now familiar material, based on a novel by Atsuhiro Yoshida, a dry-eyed, even contrarian spin in "Tsumuji Kaze Shokudo no Yoru" ("The Night of Whirlwind Restaurant").