‘Soul Kitchen’ director tries his hand at comedy

German writer-director Fatih Akin is used to winning film awards – big ones, like the Golden Bear at the Berlin Film Festival for his first feature, “Head-On,” and Best Screenplay at Cannes for his follow-up, “The Edge of Heaven.” But fans of those films– serious studies involving suicide, addiction, death, imprisonment and lost love– are going to be surprised that Akin has another side to him: He also knows how to make a light, lively, funny movie.

In “Soul Kitchen,” which opens Friday and won last year’s Special Jury Prize at the Venice Film Festival, he presents a tale of a completely disorganized owner of a less-than-fancy restaurant in Hamburg who finds himself surrounded by co-workers and hangers-on who are a lot less together than he is. He also has to deal with tax collectors, health inspectors and the fact that his girlfriend might be leaving him. It’s all played out in a sort of goofy manner, and is propelled by a terrific soundtrack of mostly American soul music.

“I wrote the first draft of the script in 2003,” said Akin, 37, during a recent visit to Boston to promote the film. “But there were many, many rewrites with many, many dead ends.”

It was, he now realizes, a time of self-doubt. The first draft was done before the success of “Head-On.” When that movie became a hit, he felt the pressure of needing to live up to it.

“But ‘Soul Kitchen’ was just a comedy, and I didn’t trust it,” he said. “So I started rewriting it and changing it, but each rewrite was worse than the next.”

Akin reached a point where he didn’t even know if he wanted to make it anymore. But then a close friend, who also served as his producer, died.

“He always wanted me to make the film,” said Akin. “I was grieving for six months, and then I realized that doing the film could be a way out of that suffering.”

But that was only half of the reason he eventually went through with it. The rest of it was even more personal.

“I was starting to feel old,” he said with a quiet laugh. “I used to hang around in clubs and bars; that was a very important part of my life when I was younger. Going out in the nighttime was a huge part of my socialization.

“Before I became a filmmaker I was a waiter and a bartender and a DJ, and the whole lifestyle in the film was a lifestyle of mine. But now I’m married and have a kid. Now if I go to clubs I’m the oldest person there and I don’t feel comfortable. So I had to say goodbye to that lifestyle, and I decided to do it through this film.”

Akin based a lot of his script on the real-life exploits of his film’s star, Adam Bousoukas, who plays the befuddled, anxious and cuddly Zinos, a guy who manages to find ways to help everyone but himself.

“We’ve known each other since the age of 10, and he’s my best friend,” said Akin. “At one time, Adam was a waiter in a restaurant. When he had the opportunity, he bought it, and had it for almost 10 years. So the film is based on his restaurant,” where, he added, again laughing, “the food was garbage.”

Akin borrowed from– or, as he put it, was inspired by– two food-related films that helped him make “Soul Kitchen.”

“I studied Ang Lee’s ‘Eat Drink Man Woman’ for how to shoot food,” he admitted. “Another inspiration was Stanley Tucci’s ‘Big Night.’ It’s so well written and so funny, and certain food shots in my film are taken from that.”

But the most important part of the film for Akin was the music, of which he chose about 80 percent of the songs.

“Because I was DJ’ing I have a lot of records, and I’m still collecting vinyl. My only sin now is spending a lot of money on vinyl. But the film isn’t about just being the favorite music of the director. It’s more like I was looking for the right sound for the film.

“We have music from Louis Armstrong, Sam Cooke, Etta James, Curtis Mayfield and many more,” he added. “We wanted to use the Doors song ‘Soul Kitchen,’ but we got all of the other songs for 250,000 euros, and the publisher wanted 100,000 euros just for the Doors, so we didn’t use it.”

On top of it all, Akin has calmed down about all that pressure of making “just a comedy” after doing such serious fare, and is happy with the results.

“It was very difficult to do,” he said. “But from time to time, maybe I should do a comedy. It’s more difficult than the heavy stuff, but it’s worth it. Maybe every 10 years.”