Juzo Itami is the brilliant Japanese director who made comedies full of keen observations and strange obsessions. Tampopo, his second film, is a moving story about ramen and about food in life.

Almost a satire of spaghetti western movies, the film tells us about a hero (truck driver Goro) helping a damsel in distress (single mother Tampopo), teaching her the art of noodles, and searching together for the perfect recipe. Interweaved into their adventure are short interpolated stories, which give the film a rich flavour: a sick wife cooking her last dinner for her poor family, a beggar giving a lecture about Burgundy wine, elegant ladies slurping spaghetti in etiquette class, a gangster dreaming of boar hunting before death…

It has such a delicate recipe of wit, hedonism, and good taste, that it always makes me feel hungry afterwards.

I saw this pillow from a BBC article. O what great placebo for obscure desire! What great symbol of solitude! What great blend of animalism and daintiness!

A psychologist found that baby monkeys prefer an artifical mother made of cloth than one made of wires. So, to all lonely boys, and to all exhausted human resources, this lap pillow should provide enough warmth and happiness. Magna civitas, magna solitudo — and we are but monkeys in it.