The Menu

Modern luxury setting with several non-white supporting roles (Hong Chau, Leguizamo, Yang, Castro, Carrero). Leads are mostly white. Diversity fits a rich restaurant crowd and is not sold as a diversity lesson. Elsa was once scripted as Scandinavian and cast with Chau, but the movie never makes her race the point.

Lots of talk about class, entitlement, and how rich guests use cooks and servers. One course and related talk cover the chef’s sexual harassment of a woman staffer. Viewers hear clear anti-snob, anti-rich lines. Not race or LGBTQ identity lectures.

Core story is class revenge and fake food status, not race or queer identity. A clear side beat punishes male harassment and splits men and women for one course. Margot’s win is framed as service-worker honesty beating rich pretension. Noticeable class politics; light gender/harassment edge.

Easy to see: rich elites, critics, finance bros, and empty high-end culture get torn down. Staff and artists are shown as burned out by money and fans. Tyler’s male foodie ego is crushed. Strong class and labor satire with #MeToo-adjacent and male-entitlement beats, not a race or colonial-guilt sermon.

Some anti-woke reviews and video essays call the class politics heavy-handed or “woke.” No major mass boycott or constant mainstream culture-war storm. Complaints that count here target left-leaning class messaging, not “not diverse enough” critiques.

Stored scores for key creatives are mostly low to mild. Writers come from progressive satire comedy; the director is prestige-drama focused, not an activist brand. Producer and casting signals are mild industry-left, not a hard DEI activist package for this film.