MOSTLY MARTHA

By Richard Corliss Sunday, Aug. 25, 2002
    • "I'm not compulsive. I'm precise," says Martha Klein (Martina Gedeck), chef of a ritzy Hamburg restaurant. Precise, sure, but her loveless life still needs a bit of leavening. That comes in two packages: her balky 8-year-old niece (Maxime Foerste) and a lavishly charming Italian sous-chef (Sergio Castellitto). The setup and payoff of this German export couldn't be more conventional, but Nettelbeck is a sharp observer of life's surprises, and Gedeck has an appraising, intelligent beauty. Her Martha is like the film: tart on the outside, sweet on the inside, with a delectable aftertaste.