"Vatel" lavishes beaucoup francs on re-creating the court of the Sun King, Louis XIV, in the France of 1671, and then kills the effect with a script that's from hunger. Whatever they spent hiring "Shakespeare in Love" Oscar winner Tom Stoppard to adapt an original screenplay by Jeanne Labrune, they was robbed. What there is of a plot involves cooking. Gerard Depardieu, looking alarmingly beefy, plays Vatel, the steward to the Prince de Conde (Julian Glover). The prince is going bankrupt, but if Vatel can cook up a feast fit for a king when Louis (Julian Sands) visits the prince's country chateau all will be well. That's the movie, with Vatel acting like a pre-Food Network Emeril taking time out for bedding a courtesan (Uma Thurman) and stopping the king's brother (Murray Lachlan Young) from buggering little boys. This putrid dish marks a new low for director Roland Joffe and — mon Dieu — he's the guy who gave us Demi Moore in "The Scarlet Letter."

“(We're Not) The Jet Set”

George Jones and Tammy Wynette were still married when they recorded the tongue-in-cheek "(We're Not) The Jet Set." The lyrics, written by Nashville songwriter Bobby Braddock, who also penned Wynette's "D-I-V-O-R-C-E" and Jones' "He Stopped Loving Her Today," make fun of the good life by declaring, "We're not the Jet Set/We're the old Chevrolet set." Braddock recalled that while writing the song, he needed the name of a city that evened out the rhyme he had with "Riviera" and "Missourah." “I got out a Rand McNally atlas," he said. "In the first part are the maps. The last part is an alphabetical listing of cities. I wanted a rustic, small-time sound. I went to the listing for Missouri. And I found 'Festus.' I loved the sound of it."