Opens on Friday in Manhattan.Directed by David GelbIn Japanese, with English subtitles1 hour 21 minutes; not ratedAn aristocracy of taste guides the philosophy behind Sukiyabashi Jiro, the tiny, sushi-only restaurant in the Ginza shopping district of Tokyo that is spotlighted in David Gelb’s hagiographic debut feature, “Jiro Dreams of Sushi.” The chef, Jiro Ono, 85 in the film, plainly sees no reason to alter the 10-seat, fixed-menu, basement establishment — much less retire from a profession in which he is widely regarded as a god among men. Why change a good thing, when, in 2008, Michelin’s inaugural Tokyo guide awarded the eatery three stars — sans toilet? (The rating was reaffirmed in November.)Mr. Ono’s cult of admirers in this 81-minute documentary includes a Japanese food critic, the patiently diligent kitchen workers, an awe-struck former apprentice, dealers in fish and rice, cooing customers, and two sushi-slinging sons fully aware of the paternal burden of excellence.

They all yield valuable angles on the master, but despite foodie-baiting close-ups of nigiri sushi brushed with soy sauce, and montages of skillful food prep, the film falls short as a satisfying exploration of craft. Like many other such portraits, it wastes valuable time declaring its subject’s excellence that could be spent fleshing out demonstrations, explanations, context.Mr. Ono’s inspiring dedication is not in doubt: it will come as no surprise that he is a workaholic. Rather more absorbing are his story of fleeing home at 9 (later photos show a young man staring with rock-solid confidence), his parsing of fatty tuna’s simplistic taste and glimpses of his wicked wit. The question of authorship within restaurants remains tantalizingly, or politely, open; the filmmakers fabricate suspense around the relative merits of Mr. Ono’s eldest son, Yoshikazu, whose managerial role is paramount.Slathered in the Philip Glass iterations that have become a hackneyed substitute for editorial momentum, the documentary is shot with the Red camera, whose look is well suited to the glistening of the exquisitely prepared fish.

It sure beats takeout.Every year, thousands of people pay more than $350 to eat sushi at a 10-seater restaurant in a Tokyo subway station, making reservations at least a month in advance to dine at one of the few fast-food stands in the world to earn three stars from the Michelin guide. yo sushi menu kingstonThe proprietor, Jiro Ono, is in his mid-80s, and has spent his life innovating and refining, always asking himself, “What defines deliciousness?” samurai sushi menu new orleansDavid Gelb’s documentary Jiro Dreams Of Sushi shows what a meal at Sukiyabashi Jiro is like: each morsel prepared simply and perfectly, then replaced by another as soon as the previous piece is consumed, with no repetition of courses. thai food delivery london w2

Once an item is gone, it doesn’t come back. That’s why each one has to be memorable. Jiro Dreams Of Sushi also covers Ono’s background and his family, including his two grown sons: the elder has been waiting patiently for decades to take over the business, and the younger runs a more casual version of his dad’s restaurant across town. where to buy sushi grade fish in londonGelb talks to a top Japanese food critic who explains what makes Ono’s sushi so sublime, and shadows Ono’s apprentices, who have to learn how to properly wring a hot towel before he’ll allow them to slice a fish or cook an egg. He also follows Ono’s vendors, who adhere to the philosophy “If 10 tuna are for sale, only one can be the best.” But while everyone takes their jobs seriously, Gelb’s documentary is far from humorless. At one point, Ono probably speaks for some people in the audience when he jokes that one of his vendors “seems so knowledgeable, I worry that he’s making it up.”

Even at a brief 81 minutes, Jiro Dreams Of Sushi runs a little longer than it needs to, given that it’s making the same point over and over: that it takes uncommon dedication to repeat the same steps every day for decades, always looking for ways to make the process better, not easier. But Gelb creates a peaceful, contemplative mood with his long shots of men delicately molding fish onto rice, such that when Ono walks past a blaring shopping-mall video-screen at one point, the intrusion of the modern world seems out of place. In the end, maybe Ono and his staff are deluding themselves when they say their goal is to present each ingredient at its peak moment of tastiness. But this movie argues persuasively that it’s that constant pursuit of improvement—even to the best sushi in the world—that gives us all a reason to wake up and punch in.The quintessential “lifestyle” documentary, Jiro Dreams of Sushi combines a profile of a celebrity chef, a quick cultural immersion and many mouth-watering montages of food preparation in one package.

Akin to one of The New Yorker’s vintage profiles, the film begins with a few attention-grabbing facts about its subject and gradually adds layers of broader and deeper context, touching on persona,, family and the esthetic and culinary traditions of Japan. The star is Jiro Ono, a revered 85-year-old sushi chef who runs Sukiyabashi Jiro, a 10-seat restaurant in the basement of an office building adjacent to the Ginza subway station in Tokyo. In spite of its location, Sukiyabashi Jiro has a three-star Michelin rating as one of the finest restaurants in the world. Reservations must be made a month in advance and meals start at $300 a person. We know this when an out-of-towner bumbles into the unprepossessing restaurant, wondering if they have any take-out menus. When he’s told the price and reservation wait, he backs out bowing quickly. We know how great the restaurant is from Tokyo food critic Masuhiro Yamamoto, who declares that no other restaurant in Tokyo can compare: “No one ever has a bad experience there,” he says.

The standard course, without the distractions of alcohol or main courses, is a 20-piece symphony of sushi from mild to increasing complex tastes, guided by traditional rules of extreme simplicity (no sushi pizzas here) and precision. Fish slices are lightly brushed with soy sauce and wasabi. There are three kinds of tuna, of different degrees of fatness. Shrimp are killed moments before being served. Jiro has his own rice dealer, who refuses to sell to the top hotels because they wouldn’t know what to do with his quality of rice. The egg tuna that serves as desert is an art form in itself: One of the kitchen cooks said he took months before his first piece was accepted. The film is a portrait of the artisan ( shokunin) as an old man. At work since he was 9, Ono is a former soldier who, since he first apprenticed as a chef, has dreamed about ways to improve sushi. He obsesses about improving his craft by getting the best ingredients, massaging the octopus 40 minutes instead of 30, and experimenting to find exactly the right serving temperature.

What else is the film about? The traditional, and sometimes negative obsession with dedication and sacrifice. Ono is proudly tough, a workaholic, who says he derives a kind of ecstasy from work, which depends on others sacrificing for him. At 70 he had a heart attack and decided that, perhaps, it was time to let his sons buy fish from the market for him. The shadow of mortality convinced him he had to delegate some responsibilities. He apparently has a wife because we see her in a photograph. He chuckles when he recounts that, on the rare day he stayed home, his sons used to wonder who the strange man was sleeping in his mother’s bed. And of course, the sacrifice is also imposed on others. The youngest son, Takashi, runs his own cheaper branch of the restaurant in the tourist-friendly Roppongi Hills, while the oldest son Yoshikazu, now in his late 50s, patiently waits to inherit the business. As a young man he dreamed of racing cars. Now he rides a bicycle to the market each day, to negotiate with an elite fraternity of top fish dealers, who save their best for Jiri’s restaurant.