Have you ever craved a dish just by watching someone eat it on screen and wished you could have it right in front of you? At Gourmet Cinema by Sunset Cinema Club, co-founded by Sanchit Gupta and Sahil Kapoor, this idea comes to life as you watch a character tuck into a meal on screen, only for the same dish to arrive at your table moments before the scene unfolds. The experience brings together the pleasures of cinema and dining, making food an extension of the story.
Priced at ₹3,000 per person, the experience includes a film screening and a five-course menu designed around the movie. The concept takes the pairing a step further, timing dishes to coincide with specific moments in the narrative. “Over the last couple of years, we’ve been tinkering with the idea of pairing cinema with food,” says Gupta.
The company began with outdoor cinema screenings in 2017 and has been hosting them across Indian cities since. Bengaluru joined its circuit in 2018, with Gourmet Cinema introduced in the city last year. “The initial idea was to do a curated menu around the film. That later evolved into, ‘What if we serve the same things that they’re serving in the film at the same time?’ Because that would make it even more immersive,” he notes.
The team did a pilot show around this in Bombay a couple of years ago, and it did pretty well. We already have a good audience for our open-air shows, and we thought this could be a new idea. So we decided to scale it to multiple cities. Choosing a film is the first step. The process begins with watching the film carefully and noting the featured food, along with key moments that could lend themselves to a particular dish. The menu is planned around these cues. “Our first criterion is that either food should be an integral part of the film or it should have something to do with travel,’ Gupta explains, adding, “With both kinds of movies, you are able to create a menu.”
While films such as Ratatouille and Chef offer opportunities for food pairings, travel-oriented films allow the team to build a menu around the places and cultures depicted.
Gourmet Cinema is held almost every weekend in Bengaluru, usually on Saturdays or Sundays, at partner venues. “If it’s a travel film like Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara, you can do an entire Spanish menu around the film. Even though food is not the focus of the movie, as a viewer, you are able to immerse yourself in the film better if you have Spanish food served along with it,” he points out. For movies like Ratatouille, it’s basically whatever is being served in the film.
However, Gupta says timing is very crucial. The dishes must arrive before the corresponding scenes appear on screen, allowing the audience to connect what they are eating with what they are watching. Some adjustments are made for practical reasons. “If it’s a very iconic dessert, like the one in The Grand Budapest Hotel, we don’t necessarily serve it at that particular point. We serve it at the end,” he shares, noting, “As an audience member, you’re still able to connect with it. You understand it logically as well. Why would you serve a dessert in the second course, for instance? If it’s an iconic dessert, you’ll appreciate that it’s being served at the end of the film.”
A concept very international movie-coded, Gupta says, it need not be limited to international cinema; the team is also exploring regional cinema, including Malayalam and Kannada films, although finding the right titles for the format remains a challenge.
( Upcoming screenings: Eat Pray Love on October 24 at Helen’s Place, Marathahalli and Ratatouille on October 25 at Hamilton, Whitefield. For tickets, visit: sunsetcinemaclub.in )