Although romantic comedies are generally shit, what with the terrible acting and the fact that every story line is essentially the same, every now and then it’s pretty fun to give one a watch for the pure cringe factor alone. Whilst sitting down to choose which movie monstrosity I was about to dedicate the next hour and a bit of my life to from a Wikipedia list of British rom-coms, I came across something that shook me to my very core.

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What appeared in my browser was a wrinkled face I was all too familiar with, leering over from behind the shoulders of a stereotypically posed couple in the midst of a clinically clean kitchen. It was none other than world renowned celebrity chef Gordon Ramsay and I was spooked. After spending a couple of minutes glancing through the ‘Love’s Kitchen’ biography, it was pretty jokes to learn that Ramsay’s very first acting role only received £121 in it’s opening weekend. But I still had so many questions: How does this film exist, and why? How had nobody ever mentioned this film to me before? So many thoughts raced through my mind and I knew that I needed to watch the ‘Hell’s Kitchen’ romantic rip off immediately. Here’s pretty much everything that happened, so now you don’t have to waste precious moments of your life just like I foolishly did.

The film credits set the scene in by initially showing us a menagerie of mouth watering food preparation close ups and clips of busy chefs skilfully performing their profession, presumably in the very kitchen where the magic is going to happen. The first actual face we see is of a male chef that we know is the lead male because we’ve seen a picture of the DVD box, and he’s busy placing some sort of strawberry dessert out to order. An unidentified woman takes this delicious morsel that turns out to be a trifle to its table and one can only assume that this conventionally attractive headless body is about to be the story’s main love interest.

Or maybe not because it cuts to a clip of his wife driving in her car – we know this because she rings him and he nags her to pull over before she does herself some damage or gets told off by the police. In a totally unsurprising turn of events, she crashes into the back of a tractor, conveniently creating a gap for a new woman to enter his life.

Fast forward some-amount-of-time and we catch our first glimpse of the real star of the show as he is handed a list of restaurant reviews by one of his staff. In the pile of “avoid” venues lies a sour description of his mate Rob’s place ‘The World’s End’, that has evidently taken a turn for the worse following his wife’s death. It’s the anniversary of her abrupt demise and loverboy isn’t taking it so well.

Everyone seems to be watching some old food reviewing cook on the telly, including the actual love interest. And guess what? She’s a food reviewer too, so it’s pretty obvious what’s going to happen whilst she’s feeling awfully lonely living back in her hometown.

Meanwhile, good old Gordon has popped over to ‘The World’s End’ to give his pal a helping hand. After handing him the neggy review and some watered down tellings off from the celeb chef, Ramsay seemingly disappears from the kitchen without any trace or explanation whilst loverboy Rob pops off to sort some unfinished business. Weird.

As it turns out, the unfinished business happened to be buying the pub that his late wife wanted to buy before she died. Whilst speaking to the owner, hot new girl Kate shows up and introduces herself to her unbeknownst future sweetie. Hottie tries to convince the pub owner not to sell up before accusing Rob of being presumably both untalented or over pretentious. This guy clearly can’t catch a break and all this tension is blates going to lead to some angry hate sex at some point later in the film, but not right now because Rob fucks off in a huff without even saying goodbye.

Cut to a swanky dinner party, thrown by Kate’s very own father (who isn’t so keen on the idea of a new restaurant bringing all sorts of riff raff to their quaint little village). A rich looking cougar with an Italian toy boy in tow alludes that “the first divorce is always the worst,” meaning that Kate is blatantly back due to a recent split. Everyone knows it and she’s even hit on twice by some random guys at the party. Looks like the recently single lady will be in luck because she’s in a rom com and that’s just what happens.

Loverboy isn’t in attendance – instead he’s trying out a few new recipes and his old trifle trick on his sous chef and daughter. They love it. They immediately go in search of all the venue’s old staff to get the dream team back again. It’s almost like he’s going to turn his restaurant around so that a certain critic will write a good review and fall in love with him. Almost.

Except they’ll be in a new location: the old pub. Loverboy and hottie bump into each other as he’s piling in to exchange a few quips and jibes. You can almost see his dick harden. It’s vomit inducing.

After redesigning the pub and painting a fairly unmissable “NO DOGS OR CRITICS” sign above the entrance, the eatery opens up for business. Although it’s a slow start and hottie is the third to try the new menu, despite breaking the no critic rule. As it turns out, she likes the food. Especially the fucking trifle which she refers to as being “seriously sexy.” At this rate it’s only a matter of time until Kate will be happily chowing down on Rob too.

That is, unless someone else gets there first. Whilst out for a jog, Kate bumps into one of the guys from the party who tries to make a move again and it becomes clear that he’s her ex. He was definitely punching above his weight there. She rejects his advances, pushes the posh cunt off the fence and runs back to the pub.

With still no customers, Kate decides to do Rob a non-sexual favour and write a review of his boss ass food anyway. When people catch wind (not literally), the phone rings off the hook with bookings and the next morning they’re full to capacity for weeks ahead.

Kate’s bastard father isn’t too pleased about this – the traffic in the village is getting his knickers fully in a twist.

Speaking of knickers, loverboy still hasn’t got into Kate’s. After putting his daughter to bed and falling asleep on the sofa, Kate nearly goes in for the kiss after being awoken by Rob’s presence. Although their lips don’t quite make it and instead they make some small talk about his dead wife. What a mood killer. They make their excuses then head to their separate beds. Zzz.

During preparations the next morning Rob, Rob’s little girl and Kate are all chopping vegetables like a happy little family. Kate mentions how good a father he is. Rob mentions that she needs a mother and then swiftly moves himself around the table to teach her how to cut properly. It might as well be her wrists that they’re cutting as we’re more than halfway through the film and they still haven’t done it yet. He mentions how beautiful her hands are, she talks about her ex, bla bla bla.

Foodies are flocking in their droves to the restaurant. This swanky geezer arrived in a helicopter but somehow landed in Kate’s Dad’s garden, much to his annoyance.

Things start to hot up in the kitchen amidst the chaos as loverboy goes in for the snog. Finally. The passion is quickly interrupted by Kate’s ex who bursts in to order something that has been taken off the menu. Obviously his reaction to the shenanigans before him isn’t a positive one.

The pair sneak off for a bonk at Kate’s Dad’s house. Get in.

Kate’s Dad and ex team up to form the fun police and get revenge on Rob. They go undercover to plant a few rats in the kitchen and ring the health inspector, who finds the furry friends scuttling about the pantry the following morning.

After post-coital Kate wakes up, she flurries downstairs in a state of contentment like we’d never seen before. In her blissful joy, she spoon feeds her father a mouthful of the famous trifle that everyone’s been munching on. Daddy loves it and feels a little guilty after seeing the apple of his eye so elated.

But obvs it’s too late and loverboy Rob’s gaff gets shut down, pending a review by the council. Kate’s smarmy ex is delighted to deliver the news himself. Wuh oh.

Rob blates thinks Kate has something to do with it after seeing her Dad and ex’s signatures on the summons. He confronts her about the bad review from the beginning of the film, that happened to be written by her all along, and kicks her out on her arse. Things are looking rocky for the not-so-happy couple and they aren’t even official yet.

But what’s this? A representative of the royal family rocks up to announce that that food reviewer bloke from the telly will be attending for a meal the next day, which happens to be the day of Rob’s court appearance. With no other option, loverboy instructs his team on how to prepare the meals correctly in order to please the prestigious guest.

It didn’t take much convincing for Rob to sack off the appearance in front of the council, but luckily Kate sees her chance to make amends. But the elders aren’t impressed by her protest and she’s thrown out. Although one council member wasn’t quite sure about a complaint against the Hell’s Angels being regular guests.

Back in the restaurant, the televised review is going swimmingly. To sum it up, he said that it’s a perfect meal that was well worth the detour. Bon appetit!

We all knew the pub wouldn’t be closed for good. The Hell’s Angel actually ended up being the rich cougar from the beginning of the story, and not a violent thug after all. She tells Rob that he needs to make up with Kate as she was the one fighting his battles whilst he was making food for famous people. But lo and behold, she’s left for the airport. This is like ‘Friends’ all over again.

Loverboy only goes and crashes his bloody car due to speeding. What would his ex wife think? For fuck’s sake Rob, get your shit together.

But he still finds her, although she’s pretty pissed off over the whole situation and tries to reverse over him. He probs deserved it though.

But obvs they make up and make out in the end. Kate has promised to do all the driving from now on so we won’t have to worry about Rob’s dangerous driving.

And then at the very last moment after a very cringeworthy fade out, Gordon Ramsay is back on our screens. The celeb chef who hasn’t even been in the film since his cameo at the very beginning is seen gawping at his computer screen, happy in the knowledge that his fictional mate is back on his feet and got the gal. Clearly they blew all their budget on his measly appearance because ‘Love’s Kitchen’ is total garbage.

If watching awful films is your guilty pleasure too, then it might mean you actually have a pretty high IQ. Check it out.