Food, love, sex, death, noodles: it's all here in Jūzō Itami's fabulous feast for the senses. Tampopo's central story concerns a widowed ramen shop owner/operator (Nobuko Miyamoto) determined to find the perfect recipe, one that will turn her failing restaurant into the greatest ramen-ya in town, with the help a couple of truck-driving wandering ronin/broth connoisseurs (Tsutomo Yamazaki and Ken Watanabe). Interwoven are a series of vignettes exploring the tension between rigid social mores and natural human appetites, through the culinary adventures of amorous gangsters, repressed etiquette tutors, anxious salarymen and overworked housewives. Funny, tender and even surreal, this endlessly charming tale also features some of the most mouth-watering food ever put on screen.

This is a film about enjoying the moment, wandering through back alleys of storylines and characters that exist purely for the pleasure of meeting them, sampling haute cuisine and comfort food with equal gusto. It's been called a “ramen western” (and does feature cowboys, of a kind) but Tampopo is something much more difficult to categorise, bursting with life and filled with indelible images.