Guus Bosman

The main feature after A Son's Sacrifice was A Table In Heaven, a documentary about the Maccioni family that runs the famous La Cirque restaurant in New York.

The documentary gives a very personal insight in the life of the Maccioni family, and their work to re-open the La Cirque restaurant in a new location in New York. The film maker was able to film private moments of the family, while they are living their life -- laughing, arguing, working and discussing all the details of the new restaurant.

My personal favorite scenes were when Mr. Sirio Maccioni, the founder of the restaurant, visits his son in Las Vegas who operates a successful La Cirque branch there. The son tells his kids: "keep the house tidy while grandpa is here!". When he later shows his father an elaborate Excel sheet with a business plan, the father ignores him and you can see the generation gap and differences in approaches.

The father and son from the movie were at the Q&A session, together with the Andrew Rossi, the director of the documentary. The director said that the he started working with the family in October 2004, and this afternoon was the first time the father and son saw the movie ("I am still stressed").

It was nice to see the main characters in real life, and it makes your realize again that this not a fiction movie but a real documentary. A funny question from the audience: "Do you still have the same real estate agent and does he still advice you on your regular business also?" The real estate agent the lady referred to can be seen in the film advising the family on restaurant matters, almost as a consigliere.

Honestly, I had not heard of the La Cirque restaurant before, but the film gives some background on how Mr. Maccioni grew the restaurant to the place to be seen. When the family had a grand reopening at the new location, an incredible amount of celebrities paid a visit. When Mr. Maccioni couldn't decide between 2 locations to open the new restaurant, he followed the advice from a regular guest, Henry Kissinger.

It was a good decision of Full Frame to show these 2 movies, both about family businesses, together.