amazon instant video rental "Jiro Dreams of Sushi" $0.99

This is free on Netflix... Also, painfully boring movie. It just keeps bragging about this old Japanese chef who they film looking solemnly on his customers as they eat his over priced sushi. This is a feature film length infomercial about some seriously over-hyped fish.

I found the whole "pursuit of excellence" to be unconvincing and embarrassingly disingenuous. This is a story about a businessman selling expensive fish. My interpretation is that he was on a life-long pursuit of bamboozling people into believing he is some sort of Sushi god. I found it to be pretty pathetic, and often monotonous in it's repetition of the same old praise with no dissenting opinions.


The majority of people won't be able to tell the difference between $6 sushi and Jiro's sushi. However, if someone tells them that Jiro is a genius, has dedicated his life to making sushi, they will gladly pay several times that and actually tear up as they're eating it because it's "so good". It's marketing, and Jiro has built up a reputation that sells sushi. It's not the sushi that has built up his reputation. Jiro is a marketing genius, he was able to sell dedication to craft so effectively as to make the quality of his product irrelevant. There's no doubt Jiro is a good sushi chef. But Sushi God? Please...

I bet if $6 fish was served at Jiro's, someone would declare it the best in the world. After all, Jiro the sushi God said it's good. So it must be good.

Funny enough, the documentary glosses over the fact that his son is now solely managing his father's restaurant. When the Michelin star people came over, his son was the one who prepared the fish. So the Michelin people really tasted sushi prepared by Jiro's son. They thought they were eating the "Sushi God's" food, but in reality they were eating his son's food. They could not tell the difference, so they awarded Jiro the 3 Michelin stars. At some point the subtleties of sushi become so fine as to be indistinguishable, in such cases it all comes down marketing.

Even the most discriminating palates cannot discriminate between sushi prepared correctly from fresh fish by different, half-way decent sushi chefs.

People really need to be more resilient to marketing...

edit: I should disclaim my comment by saying that I have the utmost respect for Japanese culture and the Japanese people in general. I have been on a Japan cinema binge on Netflix, which is why I watched this doc. Even though I understand Jiro is regarded as a "Japanese national treasure", my criticism of this doc should not be interpreted as an attack on Japanese people/culture.

It's free if you have Prime too.

Was a free offering for Amazon Prime members for the last month or two IIRC. Got very positive reviews critically. Tried to watch it a few weeks back, fell asleep on the sofa about 20 minutes in. But I do that with a lot of movies frankly. Your sofa may vary.

Awesome film

Watch the trailer first to help decide whether this is your kind of thing.

Some of y'all will find his pursuit of excellence to be inspiring. Others, like dude above, will conclude that it's a waste of 2 hours s/he'll never get back.

Watch the trailer first.

Quote from euwil : This is free on Netflix... Also, painfully boring movie. It just keeps bragging about this old Japanese chef who they film looking solemnly on his customers as they eat his over priced sushi. This is a feature film length infomercial about some seriously over-hyped fish. It does not show how to make good sushi or even discuss what makes Jiro's sushi worth $5000 for dinner...

Amazon Prime and Netflix has a monthly or yearly fee and is not free...

When I signed up for Amazon Prime few months ago this was free. Now I seen most of it I wouldn't watch it again if it was free. For those who don't know, it's a documentary of a chef who likes to make sushi. He's very passionate about it and considered one of the best in the world.

If you looking for some inspiration I suppose you could get something out of this. It's no different from watching a movie about a baseball player driven to perfection. They have their routines they do to prepare, they make sure they have the best equipment, they had really good mentoring, they are persistent and won't anyone stand in their way, etc.

Quote from euwil : This is free on Netflix... Also, painfully boring movie. It just keeps bragging about this old Japanese chef who they film looking solemnly on his customers as they eat his over priced sushi. This is a feature film length infomercial about some seriously over-hyped fish. It does not show how to make good sushi or even discuss what makes Jiro's sushi worth $5000 for dinner...

Your review is painfully incorrect as well. You really shouldn't talk down about something you obviously have no comprehension of.

Quote from cify_b : It's free if you have Prime too.

That's where it is...

Quote from euwil : This is free on Netflix... Also, painfully boring movie. It just keeps bragging about this old Japanese chef who they film looking solemnly on his customers as they eat his over priced sushi. This is a feature film length infomercial about some seriously over-hyped fish. It does not show how to make good sushi or even discuss what makes Jiro's sushi worth $5000 for dinner...

Your comment is painful to read and flat out wrong. The movie makes very clear why Jiro's sushi is so good. He goes to market himself to pick out the fish. He only selects the very freshest and best tuna or whatever that day to make. If the fish isn't perfect he won't buy it.

He film also talks about the secret of good sushi being in the rice. He also said the best sushi is served at room temperature. They cover just about everything that goes into making good sushi.

Quote from mychen : Awesome film Watch the trailer first to help decide whether this is your kind of thing. Some of y'all will find his pursuit of excellence to be inspiring. Others, like dude above, will conclude that it's a waste of 2 hours s/he'll never get back. Watch the trailer first.

I found the whole "pursuit of excellence" to be unconvincing and embarassingly disingenuous. This is a story about a businessman selling expensive fish. My interpretation is that he was on a life-long pursuit of bamboozling people into believing he is some sort of Sushi god. I found it to be pretty pathetic, and often monotonous in it's repetition of the same old praise with no dissenting opinions.

Perhaps the movie was simply poorly thought out and unable to communicate the "genius" of Jiro. Maybe, but I doubt it.

Watch the trailer, if you want the same with a bunch of filler and the same script repackaged dozens of times, watch the movie.

Quote from stevenq : Your comment is painful to read and flat out wrong. The movie makes very clear why Jiro's sushi is so good. He goes to market himself to pick out the fish. He only selects the very freshest and best tuna or whatever that day to make. If the fish isn't perfect he won't buy it. He film also talks about the secret of good sushi being in the rice. He also said the best sushi is served at room temperature. They cover just about everything that goes into making good sushi.

I'm sorry, but that doesn't make $5000 sushi by itself. Every self respecting sushi chef does exactly the same thing. That's sushi 101

Quote from stevenq : Your comment is painful to read and flat out wrong. The movie makes very clear why Jiro's sushi is so good. He goes to market himself to pick out the fish. He only selects the very freshest and best tuna or whatever that day to make. If the fish isn't perfect he won't buy it. He film also talks about the secret of good sushi being in the rice. He also said the best sushi is served at room temperature. They cover just about everything that goes into making good sushi.

Fun fact: Sushi actually refers only to the vinegar rice used, nothing more. While we call basically anything with raw fish and rice sushi, different styles and variations have names which should be used in front of the generalized term, Sushi. Saying sushi rice is actually superfluous as well, when using the term sushi at its most base definition.

Quote from euwil : I found the whole "pursuit of excellence" to be unconvincing and embarassingly disingenuous. This is a story about a businessman selling expensive fish. My interpretation is that he was on a life-long pursuit of bamboozling people into believing he is some sort of Sushi god. I found it to be pretty pathetic, and often monotonous in it's repetition of the same old praise with no dissenting opinions. Perhaps the movie was simply poorly thought out and unable to communicate the "genius" of Jiro. Maybe, but I doubt it. Watch the trailer, if you want the same with a bunch of filler and the same script repackaged dozens of times, watch the movie. I'm sorry, but that doesn't make $5000 sushi by itself. Every self respecting sushi chef does exactly the same thing. That's sushi 101

Your comments are embarrassing, you might want to stop while you still have a shred of dignity. It's documentary style, no holds barred. He clearly wasn't bamboozling or conning anyone. At this point you're just threadcrapping.

It is a good documentary for those of us who respect and appreciate culinary arts. If your idea of good sushi is a supermarket california roll then you may not appreciate this. Likewise if your views on food are that it is only something needed to stay alive then this may not be the documentary for you. I thought the documentary did a good job telling the story of a man that has spent almost his entire life doing what he is passionate about. It also gave a glimpse of Japanese culture and the sacrifices and regrets of Jiro's passion.