Consuming Passions is a 1988 black

Black comedy

A black comedy, or dark comedy, is a comic work that employs black humor or gallows humor. The definition of black humor is problematic; it has been argued that it corresponds to the earlier concept of gallows humor; and that, as humor has been defined since Freud as a comedic act that anesthetizes...

 comedy film

Comedy film

Comedy film is a genre of film in which the main emphasis is on humour. They are designed to elicit laughter from the audience. Comedies are mostly light-hearted dramas and are made to amuse and entertain the audiences...

 conceived - though not actually written by - Michael Palin

Michael Palin

Michael Edward Palin, CBE FRGS is an English comedian, actor, writer and television presenter best known for being one of the members of the comedy group Monty Python and for his travel documentaries....

 and Terry Jones

Terry Jones

Terence Graham Parry Jones is a Welsh comedian, screenwriter, actor, film director, children's author, popular historian, political commentator, and TV documentary host. He is best known as a member of the Monty Python comedy team....

. The film stars Vanessa Redgrave

Vanessa Redgrave

Vanessa Redgrave, CBE is an English actress of stage, screen and television, as well as a political activist.She rose to prominence in 1961 playing Rosalind in As You Like It with the Royal Shakespeare Company and has since made more than 35 appearances on London's West End and Broadway, winning...

, Jonathan Pryce

Jonathan Pryce

Jonathan Pryce, CBE is a Welsh stage and film actor and singer. After studying at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and meeting his longtime partner English actress Kate Fahy in 1974, he began his career as a stage actor in the 1970s...

, and Sammi Davis

Sammi Davis

Sammi Davis is a British actress.She gained considerable praise for her performance in Ken Russell's The Rainbow...

 and was directed by Giles Foster

Giles Foster

Giles Foster has been a British television director since 1975. He specialises in television dramas. He has also directed in Australia and more recently in Germany. He wrote some television dramas in the 1970s....

. It had a limited theatrical release in the United States on 6 April 1998 and was later broadcast on British television.

Plot synopsis

The film, based on the 1973 BBC Television

BBC Television

BBC Television is a service of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The corporation, which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a Royal Charter since 1927, has produced television programmes from its own studios since 1932, although the start of its regular service of television...

 play Secrets

Secrets (play)

Secrets is a one-hour 1973 BBC Television play by Michael Palin and Terry Jones, starring Warren Mitchell as the owner of a chocolate factory...

, is about a chocolate factory that begins producing chocolates containing human flesh.