Perfection, or at least its more sublime cousin, the aspiration to it, is found in Sukiyabashi Jiro, a small, ten-seat restaurant with no toilet that is buried on the ground floor of an office building near a Ginza subway station in Tokyo. There, Jiro Ono, his eldest son, and many a reverent but haggard apprentice (some of whom have to endure ten years or more of learning how to properly fold a hot towel before being even allowed near the eggs or nori) devote their lives to one thing: the daily, rigid-but-artistic routine of producing some of the greatest sushi in the world. Some would say that they make the greatest sushi one will find, and that Ono is the premier sushi chef in the world. Jiro Dreams of Sushi is reverent and generally agrees with that assessment of the man and his work, though enough of the all-too-human poignantly bleeds through to give us a guarded, but occasionally revealing look at the glories and costs of being a Shokunin, a master artisan and craftsman with singular focus.

Jiro Dreams of Sushi follows the daily work and musings of the man considered a contemporary master, who uses sushi as one would use clay or canvas. Ono’s younger son set out on his own, and runs a sushi restaurant in the Roppongi Hill section of Tokyo. It is literally a mirror image of the father’s place, with the seating and kitchen designed opposite on the arrangement at Ono’s. 85 at the time of filming, the master seems to think about sushi all the time. It has been his life’s work to perfect the art of sushi making, to elevate it to the status of art. Along the way he has a group of dedicated buyers who navigate the impossible but poetically chaotic Tsukiji fish market for a legion of admiring patrons. Reservations are taken a year in advance, and the $300+ meal usually lasts about twenty minutes. There is no time to savor his genius; as soon as one has scarfed down a piece of sushi, there is another on the plate waiting. This is as it should be, according to another admirer, the food critic Yamamoto, who serves as our aesthetic guide throughout the film.

It is he who articulates which attributes it takes to be a master chef, traits he clearly sees in Jiro:sushi at home neuquen “1. Take your work seriouslysushi san francisco zagat 2. Aspire to improvejiro dreams of sushi download amazon 4. Be a better leader than a collaboratorgenki sushi menu kona 5. Be passionate about your work.”sushi cat 1 gra In the few brief conversations that do not revolve around sushi or the restaurant, Jiro reflects on his absent father, who taught him that life was about making it or, if you fail, having nowhere to return. sushi tei last order

This idea of endurance or disgrace was passed on to his sons. It is implied that he was not home much when they were growing up and that he expected them to become artisans with as single a devotion to craft as him. sam's club sushi grade fishIt is also apparent that the nest was closed should they come up short. The elder son is expected to follow in his father’s footsteps, so while the younger set out to start his own place, the elder son has served as an apprentice with Jiro for almost fifty years. It is not known if either son has a family, or if they too subscribe to Ono’s success-or-bust style of parenting. In any event, they clearly revere him and put a lot of pressure on themselves to continue the business and the obsessive drive for perfection. Director David Gelb is understated in his approach, to say the least. For the most part, he keeps to a straight-forward style, with a focus on the cleanliness and almost casual elegance of the daily routine, with some nice slow motion to emphasize that grace.

In most interviews, including those with vendors and patrons, Gelb lingers a few seconds after responses, catching unguarded glances, awkwardness or happiness in their faces. The beauty and estrangement of the perfectionist is the priority, and these are really the only moments where emotions are given center stage. There is some minor drama at the end of the film, and you’ll miss it if you are not paying attention. To offer a tease, it involves just whose sushi it was who wowed the Michelin judges when they awarded Jiro those coveted three stars, and why. Jiro Dreams of Sushi is a subtle meditation on art and the price it exacts from those who would seek its peaks, in the fascinating context of the sushi world. It is also an opaque but riveting study of people who strive for glory in the simple gestures of good food, clean spaces and loyalty.Trackbacks are closed, but you can .Jiro Ono is a three star Michelin chef, an honor bestowed on a select few world class chefs. He runs a small restaurant called Sukiyabashi Jiro in Tokyo, Japan that seats only 10 people and has a set menu that costs approximately $300.

You can’t just walk in off the street into Sukiyabashi Jiro – reservations are required, a few months in advance. Oh, and Jiro is 91 years old. Jiro wakes up early every morning and goes to the market to select only the choicest ingredients from the finest vendors. Sushi apprentices clamor to work for him even though for the first few years (!) of their apprenticeship they are restricted to making rice and cleaning the dishes. He has singularly focused his entire life on one thing: sushi excellence. Jiro was the subject of a critically acclaimed documentary, “Jiro Dreams of Sushi”. During one insightful moment, the filmmaker asks Jiro why he continues to work so hard, especially given his advanced age. Jiro replies, “Because as a sushi chef, every day I learn new things. Every day, I get better.” Jiro’s approach to life resonated with me. If a 90-year-old Japanese sushi master sees it as his life’s mission to better himself every day, surely I can do the same thing.

So I sat down and made a list of “stretch goals” for myself – i.e. achievements that were challenging but attainable. And one of those goals was leining (reading) the Torah in shul. For the uninitiated, let me explain why leining is so difficult. The entire Torah is written on scroll parchment in the ancient tradition which has been passed down for thousands of years. The script is not the common Hebrew script but a stylized one that has no vowels or punctuation. Let’s look at that sentence again the way it might look if the Torah were written in English: th scrpt s nt th cmmn hbrw scrpt bt stlzd n tht hs n vwls r pncttn In addition, the Torah is chanted in a complex melody called “trop”, which – you guessed it – is also not in the Torah scroll. Finally, the person leining on behalf of the congregation cannot make any mistakes in reading. If he does, vigilant congregants will correct him on the spot. When I told my friends that I was thinking about leining in shul their response was always the same: “Why would you want to do that?!”

It was as if I had told them that I wanted to try getting waterboarded. Apparently there is a commonly held belief that in order to be a good Torah reader, you need to start young, soon after your bar mitzvah, and then continue to lein in shul over the years so that the Torah portions remain fresh in your mind. When we are young our minds are like sponges and whatever we learn sticks with us for life. Case in point, I can still rattle off ‘Mon Autobiographie’ in fluent French from Monsieur Bauer’s sixth grade French class. So what is an old guy like me learning to lein for the first time? I asked myself, WWJD – What would Jiro do? “Every day I learn new things. Every day I get better.” So I began the journey. First I had to learn the trop – the musical notes. Then I selected a Torah portion. I started putting the pieces together – chanting the words together with the trop. My friend who is a rabbi and seasoned Torah reader gave me some pointers and then sent me on my way to practice.