Wine and cinema, an inevitable and continuous liaison with dozens, hundreds of movies where our beloved nectar becomes an irreplaceable protagonist in the plot of a movie. Cinema has often dedicated important spaces to wine and viticulture and long is the list of sequences that see them as characters. In some films, in fact, the wine seems almost a character, with a clearly defined role, which gives faces and meanings to the times of the seasons, to the winter silence as to the colors of autumn, to the local traditions such as to the universal myths. A glass of wine and a starry night are frequent combinations at the cinema, but the scenarios and horizons are endless. Here a short list of “movies to taste”…
Mondovino is a 2004 documentary film on the impact of globalization on the world’s different wine regions written and directed by American film maker Jonathan Nossiter. It was nominated for the Palme D’Or at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival
The film explores the impact of globalization on the various wine-producing regions, and the influence of critics like Robert Parker and consultants like Michel Rolland in defining an international style. It pits the ambitions of large, multinational wine producers, in particular Robert Mondavi, against the small, single estate wineries who have traditionally boasted wines with individual character driven by their terroir.
Sideways is a 2004 American comedy-drama film directed by Alexander Payne. A film adaption from Rex Pickett’s novel of the same name. The protagonist, Miles, is a teacher of English and oenophile, divorced and aspiring writer, who accompanies his actor friend and old college buddy Jack, who is getting married, during a week-long trip in the wine area of Santa Ynez Valley, in the county of Santa Barbara in California. Miles wants to taste wine, eat quality food, play golf to celebrate the bachelor party of his friend in style. Jack, however, is more interested in spending a libertine last weekend.
A Good Year is a 2006 British-American romantic comedy-drama film directed and produced by Ridley Scott. A wonderful tale of emotions, life and wine. Written with the assistance of Sandro Sangiorgi, Italian journalist, writer and gourmet and wine expert, it speaks of a professional in the world of high finance who inherits an estate with vineyard in Provence, where he spent his childhood. The initial idea of selling everything, will become an opportunity to begin a journey to discover himself and his past. The sun will ripen its grapes but also a new romance.
Rupi del vino (Wine cliffs) is a Italian wine documentary directed by Ermanno Olmi in 2009 “There are five reasons for drinking: the arrival of a friend, the goodness of wine, the present thirst and the one that will come, and any other reason “. Wine cliffs, on the slope of the Rhaetian Valtellina, are clinging terraces on the mountain slopes in Lombardy, still made today with the manual work, according to a tradition that dates back to 1400. Olmi pays tribute to a ‘heroic viticulture‘, living example of positive relationship with the environment, a genuine culture of wine and a natural heritage enhancement. An example so vivid that the terraced vineyards made with dry stone walls in Valtellina are now among the candidates for the UNESCO recognition as UNESCO World Heritage Sites.
Wine helped even some directors-producers to finance their own films:”I have saved my life with my wine label. Luckily people each year drink more or less the same amount of wine, while the audience of a film is unknown. The wine gives me the money needed to produce my movies alone. “, Francis Ford Coppola responds to the journalist who asked him where he found enough money to do that.
