Fear of Fanny (2006) which is a biography about Fanny Cradock and not vaginaphobia (it's a real phobia apparently) I'm currently on a Julia Davis binge, trying to find and watch all of her many tv performances in which she's starred. In this Davis plays Fanny Cradock the 70's TV chief with a devilish smirk, over her badly painted arched eyebrows .Cradock plagued the TVs in the 7Os with her mushroom vol-au-vent;s and lobster pate and all those other culinary delights which darkened the taste buds of our parents in search of that table top masterpieces for the table spreads. Cradock partner in crime her husband a permanently sozzled Johnny played excellently by Mark Gatiss. The film a BBC production, highlights the facade that Cradock created, it was all an act for the camera's and her fans. She was a bully on screen and in the home, but this hides her loneliness in her that her two sons had both left home, when Cradock hadn't approved of the girlfriends and life choices.
Its a nice nostalgia piece, all the colours principally browns, greens and yellow are all muted and look at times like vomit as does the food to be fair.
The final straw for Cradock is when she belittles a an amateur cook on the BBC TV show Esther Rantzen's Big Time, the audience finally see her for what she is.
Following the sad demise of Johnny we see Fanny, in her dotage arranging the dinner's in her care home much to the chagrin of the kitchen staff.
Its a nice study by Davis, not essential and not that funny perhaps the nature of playing a real person reigned in Davis's dark side, but does make you yearn to see what the real fanny was like.
My recollection of Fanny is from the dim and distanced past and it was the Fanny popularised by Benny Hill, which is seen in the film.
As for Vol-au-vents which I know you were thinking, I tasted these at one of my sisters weddings in the 70s, those condensed cream of mushroom soups opened my taste buds to such delights Vesta's Chow Mein with their crispy noodles, and other various over seas delights. It was around this time that I tried and tasted curried egg, which my brother and sister in law brought the recipe when traveling to the far east. 9/10 for the memories 5/10 for the food and 7/10 for the film.
