The Tasters – Review

Cert – 15, Run-time – 2 hours 3 minutes, Director – Silvio Soldini

Rosa (Elisa Schlott) is one of seven women forced to become a food taster for Hitler to ensure that it isn’t poisoned.

There’s very little tasting in The Tasters. Not just from the obvious hesitancy to try potentially poisoned food, but as the film focuses on the lives and other fears of the seven women forced to ensure that Hitler’s food is safe to eat. We see the bond that forms between them in-between meals, having been taken from their homes and forced to take on their new roles or face the consequences of not doing so.

We primarily see things through the eyes of Rosa Sauer (Elisa Schlott), a young woman taken from her in-laws home soon after arriving whilst her husband is out fighting. She leads many of the conversations and interactions that we see, and this is very much her story, playing into those of the other tasters. There are some likable moments between the group, faintly tinged with familiar emotional beats, against the backdrop of the Nazi threat they face.

A threat which itself can feel, in terms of the film’s tone, somewhat tame as a narrative with a number of familiar elements plays out in rather middle-of-the-road form. What’s present is fine, and generally sees through the 2-hour run-time, but never quite has the tension, threat or emotional effect perhaps wanted, and definitely needed. The tasting scenes themselves have the helpful layer of being what sparks everything and the film revolves around, to some extent. The uncertain fear of whether the food is or isn’t safe, and having no choice as to whether they eat it or not, plays out well, especially with the factor that the poison will likely take time to have an effect, and there’s no real knowledge as to if there’s anything that can be done if it does. Even in subsequent scenes set in the tasting room there’s still an effect to be found that stops a fully cycling feel to things.

The issues largely come when it comes to the more personal side of things to each character. It never quite feels as if The Tasters is able to fully connect to each of the handful of characters it chooses due to how much it still wants to predominantly focus on Rosa, who even still there isn’t a full connection with. Things move along generally fine, but don’t quite have the dramatic impact wanted amongst all it wants to do in moving things along while still trying to have the characters lead. It’s not quite a conflicted film, but one that feels at risk of being pulled in multiple directions whilst still being a familiarly direct, rather middling, drama.

Not quite forming the connection needed with the characters to have a dramatic effect, The Tasters is fine but has a tendency to feel familiar and almost cyclical.