BOTTLE SHOCK (2008) Paired with the Objectively Superior Cabernet and New World Syrah

We finally tackle a WINE movie! And since the 50th anniversary of the Judgment of Paris was last week, we had to cover the (highly fictionalized) movie that was made about the event. We're talking the rather silly and otherwise forgettable BOTTLE SHOCK starring Alan Rickman, Bill Pullman, Chris Pine, and Chris Pine's wig.

Dig in for a little wine history, a little film history, and a lot of rewriting a shitty script in real time.

PAIRED WITH (AI-free search links, always):

• Steven Kent Winery ELEMENTS 4-Pack, Cabernet Franc, Livermore Valley, California
• Terlato & Domaine Chapoutier Lieu-Dit Malakoff Shiraz (Syrah), Pyrenees, Victoria, Australia

Transcript

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May 23rd, 2026 marks the 50th anniversary of The Judgment of Paris, an event that changed the world of fine wine forever. Throughout the 20th century, and seemingly even before, wine had been centered in Europe, and not just Europe, but specifically France. Burgundy, Bordeaux, Côteronne, Chablis, Sancerre, Provence, Sauternes, these are the words, places. That to people all over the world meant and still mean that the wine in the bottle is some of the finest that they can find. It was on a level that almost no others could match. And behind this thinking was the all-important concept of old world superiority, which was and is rooted in the notion that fine wine requires centuries of heritage and terroir specific to the quote-unquote noble grapes of Europe. And those noble grapes were originally all French. Go figure. Wines of California and other wine-growing regions were often scoffed at and laughed away as primitive and not worth toying with. Not even if, maybe even especially if, they were growing and making wine with noble grapes meant for Francis Terroir. But by the 1970s, word of mouth was getting around that the wines coming out of California, specifically Napa Valley, were pretty GD good. British wine shop owner and educator, Stephen Spurrier, was a convert. He thought the world needed to understand how good wines from outside of France and, God forbid, all of Europe had become. So he convinced a panel of all French judges to undergo a quote-unquote blind tasting, though he did spring the blind part on them at the 11th hour, of French versus Californian wines. The best of both would be tasted side by side. Shockingly, two California wines won the top two spots. Chateau Montalena's Chardonnay and Stag Leap's Cabernet Sauvignon, beating out the Chard and Cab hailing from the finest wineries in Burgundy and Bordeaux, respectively. The French judges were so appalled, some tried to destroy their scorecards before the news could get out of what they had done. But the news did get out. And what followed was an awakening for California wine, the rise of Napa and Sonoma Valley, and the sudden obsession with all things Chardonnay and Cabernet. More than that, though, it also showed that other parts of the world could compete. France was no longer the unquestioned king of wine countries. With time, possibly any country, any terroir, could develop into a wine producing territory of equal quality, with or without noble grapes, sometimes even with indigenous grapes that weren't even of the same species as the noble grapes. It opened up the world to the world. That all said Many, even in America, especially in America, in fact, have argued that we need to stop talking about the damn judgment of Paris, that we can't keep clinging to this one story, this one event, to proclaim why people should be drinking Californian and American wines. I am not exactly one of those people. I do believe that it is true that we can't lean on it like a crutch, but it's also true that the lesson it gave to the world needs to be relearned over and over. And over again. The chokehold of Old World versus New World is still pretty pernicious. Even within the new or old world themselves, the lesson needs to be learned as we debate whether there are any good American wines outside of, say, California, Oregon, and Washington. And we had to debate Oregon and Washington not too long ago as well. In the old world, we're still rediscovering wines nearly extinct indigenous grapes from Armenia, Greece, Slovenia, Slovakia. Portugal and more. Ukrainian wine is now coming into its own. But it can't be that good, we would exclaim. Uh the whole world would basically exclaim, I keep telling people about the Ukrainian wine, and they're like, well, it's bad, right? And I'm like, no, no, it's getting good. That's the point. And so the lesson needs to be relearned again and again. But the story is deeper than the Judgment of Paris itself. Believe it or not, this wasn't the first time the Judgment of Paris was not the first time California wine beat French wine in an international competition. It was simply the latest. Now, the full story of American wine's history is way too lengthy to include here in full, but the broad strokes are. American wine in the 1800s won awards at multiple international competitions before. Finally clean sweeping the eighteen eighty nine World Fair in Paris, taking home thirty-four of thirty-six possible awards. It was basically the judgment of Paris before the judgment of Paris. In this movie that we're going to talk about here today, Bottle Shock, Alan Rickman's Stephen Spurrier quips I don't foresee the imminent cultivation of the Chicago vine in his inimitable Alan Rickman fashion. Yet it was wine from Chicago. And Los Angeles from Livermore Valley in California, even wine from Missouri that all took home awards throughout the 1800s. The French were so incensed then, after the 1889 World's Fair, that they changed the rules to invalidate all Californian wines in the preceding World Fair competitions after that year. And once we entered the early 1900s, Prohibition essentially wiped out the American wine industry, which did not fully recover until the 1960s to 1970s, when the judgment of Paris took place. And thanks to Broab Prohibition resetting American culture the way it did, we largely forgot our history of award-winning internationally competitive wines that existed nearly 150 years ago. But for now, my friends, it's time to dig into this movie Bottleshock from 2008, starring Alan Rickman, Bill Pullman, Chris Pine, Chris Pine's Wig, Freddie Rodriguez, and Rachel Taylor. And pair some, perhaps, very Californian wines, or perhaps some very new New World wines. This is a movie all about the new overtaking the old. Or maybe we're going to stick to the standard bearers from France or other parts of Europe. We shall see. But either way, happy 50th anniversary judgment of Paris as current Californians. We salute you. Are you not venturtained? Yes, sir! We'll have a real good time! He's Dave, and I'm Dallas, and this is Ventertainment. We have opinions on just about everything. Sometimes those opinions are spot on. Sometimes they go down easier with a glass of wine. This is Ventertainment. The Wine and Entertainment Pairing Podcast. Welcome to Ventertainment People. We are the podcast where we pair wine with entertainment. It's as simple as that. The end, full stop. Don't question your elders. Now, a little additional information about the real people that our movie today is going to take some massive, massive liberties with. In 1973, Steven Spurrier partnered with the International Herald Tribune writer John Wentbroth. Winroth and Patricia Gallagher to open a school in a former locksmith shop adjacent to his store. The school's mission was to teach wine appreciation to expatriate British and Americans living in France with English-speaking instruction. However, when interest grew among Parisians, French-speaking courses were also provided. This the Academie du Ven. Had been receiving many visits from California winemakers and top US wine writers, all bringing bottles for the team to try. The school's co director, American born Patricia Gallagher, suggested they hold a tasting to draw attention to the surprisingly high quality wines coming out of the US, specifically California. This came after a Napa trip in nineteen seventy five, where she returned to Paris, even more taken by the wines of California. The Academy held regular tastings of non French wines usually sourced through the embassies of nations represented, so this new idea of featuring American vintages was not a complete departure. But few wines outside of the established traditions ever really challenge the untested and unrivaled chokehold that French wines had on the world. But the question on almost no one's mind was would that French supremacy and old world superiority remain intact after the upcoming tasting which was to feature these newly appreciated American vintages? And to be fair, the old world supremacy did remain intact, give or take, after the judgment of Paris. To this day, French wine is still largely considered superior to most by Owenophiles. And Californian wines became so expensive compared to their European counterparts, thanks to a lack of government subsidies and high cost of land ownership and farming in California, that our wines are still, to this day, predominantly drunk in California. Few even make it to the East coast of our own damn country. It's a big country, but still. And never have they spread to the rest of the world the way French wine truly has. But what the judgment of Paris would do was prove that incredible wine could come from virtually anywhere, given enough time, know-how, and decently deep-grown roots of the vines themselves. Regions like Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Argentina, and Chile, not to mention re-emerging wine regions in Europe, like Greece, Hungary, Spain, Portugal, and Italy, all quickly took over the world stage and held their own against this French supremacy. While American wines still struggle with their costs and distribution system, which is hampered by laws held over from our prohibition period, putting us at an extreme disadvantage, with wines that cost more here in our own home turf. Than wines imported here from halfway around the world. Indeed. And to wrap this up, here are the results of the judgment of Paris. We really need to put some thunder and lightning sort of fully behind that. It's the judgment. The guy who doesn't edit these things is like you know what we really need to do? You know what sound effects, special effects, Dave, get on that. More words. More work. All right. So three of the top five white wines were Californian, with Chateau Montalena taking the top spot with their Chardonnay. After this upset, the French judges doubled down on trying to determine which wines tasted quote unquote French and which tasted quote unquote Californian, to not have it happen for the Reds. And they did do a better time that round. Only two Californian wines snuck into the top five spots, including Ridge Vineyards in the fifth spot. But it was once again a Californian wine in the top spot. Stag's leap cabernet Sauvignon. I love that. I always every time I say the word Sauvignon, it always it reminds me of a sketch from SNL. Anyway, cut that out. He's trying to twirl a mustache when he does it too. Uh the results shocked the room as well as the wine world. There are even stories of judges dismant demanding their scorecards back in order to mitigate the coming embarrassment. later, the US House of Representatives even voted May 24th, an important day in American history, and topped the event off with a black tie event which featured the actual Steven Spurrier, co architect of The Judgment at Paris. giving the final speech, saying, quote, It is very just and fitting that we should be here at the Smithsonian to celebrate how a Croat I love that, I love that, I love that, a Croat, uh this is Girgich, by the way, uh, and a pole, the Arnarsky, made American history in Paris with a little help from an Englishman. The Croat in question, of course, is Girgich, uh, due in large part to the result of the judgment of Paris, would go on to open a highly successful Gergich Hills winery and the pole, the Yarnarsky, would go on to sell his Stag Leaps holdings for one hundred and eighty million dollars. But note that Gergich, Mike Gergich, his full name, is nowhere to be seen in the movie we're gonna talk about today. The film makes winery owner Jim Barrett, played by Bill Pullman, the ostensible winemaker, though in real life he was not. He simply ran the business. His son, Bo, played by Chris Pine and Chris Pine's wig in this movie, is today the winemaker. I'm gonna do that every time. Is today Bo is today the winemaker at Chateau Montalena? But at the time he was a lowly cellar hand under Gergich. Who in fact had and Bo in fact had a great relationship with his father, though the film chose to dramatize them as having a turbulent one, which even included them boxing each other frequently to settle arguments. It's all fun, but not remotely accurate to history. And speaking of history, let's hit Dallas with our wine trivia question of the week. Mr. D, Chardonnay is the grape that wins the top spot in the judgment of Paris in the film. This is a Burgundian grape. So if you ever get a white burgundy of any kind, folks, it's Chardonnay. Maybe there's a second grape, a lagote or a ligotte, that you can pepper in there, but for the most part, there it has to be predominantly Chardonnay to be a proper Burgogna Blanc, Burgundy Blanc. Um, so the grape you'll find primarily a Nini Burgundy Blanc, and Chardonnay shares the same parent grape with is it A, Merlot, B, Pinot Noir. C Gamay or D Chen Blanc. All right. That is for our listeners one more time. Uh does Chardonnay share the same parent grape with A. Merlot, B Pinot Noir, C Gamay, and D Shannon Blanc? All right, I believe uh Pino is parentage for Chardonnay. m I think Shonen Blanc is there too. That's too easy. C, Gamay. I believe it's I believe the sibling of Chardonnay is Gamay. Correct, it is Gamay, which is Pinot Noir, is the parent to both of them, both Gamay and to Chardonnay. There are some writings out there that people suspect there might have been a a Pinot before Pinot Noir. Like a version of Pinot that sort of spawned proper Pinot Noir as well. And that ancient Pinot that no longer exists. Like we just see some of the DNA in all these grapes. And it's a question whether it was proper Pinot Noir that parented all these grapes or whether there was this Papa Pinot that parented everything, essentially, in the Burgundy region. But for now, what we have settled on for sure is that Pinot Noir is the parent of Chardonnay and Gamay. Good job, Dallas wins again. Alright, cut that short. Let's hit the making of segment, Dallas. Tell our listeners how this wildly fictionized fictionalized but equally entertaining film. Indeed, indeed. It is definitely entertaining. All right, guys. Here we go. The founders of the Sonoma Valley Film Festival, Mark and Brenda Lahormer, new producers Jody Savin and Randall Miller, well, in fact, and one day handed them a script which centered on a historical moment in the culture of wine known as the Judgment of Paris. Miller and Savin weren't sold on the iteration of the script. But they were quite interested in the story at its center and traveled to Sonoma to meet with both La Hormers and Jim and Beau Barrett of Chateau Montalena. It was this meeting that clinched it for them, but they decided to pivot the story to focus on the Barrett's story. The locals in the region were all well aware of what the film Sideways had done for the culture and commerce of the Central Coast after its release, and to some degree were optimistic that Bottleshock could do the same for their corner of the vine. Growing world in Napa. And as a result, the locals were more than gracious and supportive to the idea of this film. As they wrote, Alan Rickman was always in mind for the role of Steve Spurrier, whom they had already worked with on the film Noble Sun, and Bill Pullman was in their minds as they wrote the part for Jim Barrett. The film shot for 30 days from August 07 to September 07, with actors spending no more than 15 days on set. Though clever scheduling and filming techniques makes it seem as though they had more screen time with each other than they actually did. The film shot in peak season for the region, which made accommodations and facilities difficult to secure. Once in post, the team was busy crafting under and behind tight deadlines in preparation for Sundance when they met Freestyle releasing Susan Jackson. They agreed that if the big boys didn't come calling, then they would go with Freestyle. With CAA repping the film at Sundance, the team was unhappy with the offers, the highest being a $1 million bid that required Savin and Randall to match that amount for P and A. Ultimately, Bottleshock did not sell at Sundance and was collaboratively self-distributed with Freestyle Releasing. The film was released on August 6, 2008, the same week, by the way, as the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony. it was released in Napa and New York in 50 cinemas and grew to about 400 screens. Of the nearly 600 arthouse cinemas at the time, Bottleshock would play in a majority of them. So that is a bit of a feat for this film. But it would take only 280k in its opening week. Lifetime box office grosses equal 5 million domestically and 600k internationally. On That's how much Europe gave a shit about our California wine story. uh they were like, what? Come on, we don't we don't dignify that. um so yeah, it grossed five hundred uh five million domestically and six hundred K internationally on a five million dollar production budget. Though the production negotiated a home media release where they shared directly in forty percent of gross profits, so they likely did okay. And it should also be noted there was a scandal. Randall Miller, the director of Bottle Shock, he served a year in a Georgia jail for a fatal accident on the set of Midnight Rider. Miller pled guilty in 2015 to involuntary manslaughter in the death of Sarah Jones, the camera assistant who was struck by a freight train while the crew was attempting to film a scene on a bridge without permission. Turns out they never got the permits to film there. They were kind of doing it. This was not that small of a production, and they attempted to do a gorilla style without telling the crew they were doing it, guerrilla style. Seven years later, the DGA expelled Miller for life, effectively prohibiting him from directing a signatory film. The expulsion came after Miller directed another film, Coffee Wars, while on probation. Georgia prosecutor sought to revoke his probation, arguing that Miller had violated a term forbid forbidding him from directing for 10 years. Miller maintained that he believed he could direct so long as someone else was responsible for safety on set. After a lengthy hearing in 2021, a judge let Miller off with a warning and did not order him back to jail. Okay, now that all said, this is the part of the show where we break down the film act by act and then give our thoughts on wine notions in between the act breaks. So let's get started talking about act one of Bottle Shock and then what we think is actually going to pair. with this very wine centric film. Here we go. Act one The film opens in 1976, Paris. British wine merchant and sommelier Stephen Sperrier runs a struggling wine shop and wine school. His business is barely surviving, and he complains to his loyal customer Maurice, his one and only loyal customer Maurice, that the French wine establishment has become stale and elitist. Sperrier comes up with an idea to generate publicity. A blind tasting competition comparing famous French wines against wines from emerging regions around the world. Spurrier arrives in Napa Valley and immediately alienates himself to all the rugged Californians, especially Jim Barrett of Chateau Montalena. Spurrier travers to uh travels to California, rents a car, and drives through dusty vineyards, visibly unimpressed at first. Eventually he arrives in Napa Valley and meets vineyard owner Jim Barrett at Chateau Montalena. Jim is serious, overworked, and financially stressed. He distrusts the French and believes that Spurier's tasting is probably designed to embarrass California wines. Which was not uh a uh it's understandable an understandable concern. And to be fair, even though Spurier in the movie, the way they do his character, is he wants to do this for the publicity. He wants to do this to gain some notoriety, but he does not think. the California wines are going to do well. Like he is visibly like shocked that they're any good at yeah. So we're kind of skipping over a lot of the details in these synopsis, so we don't belabor it too much. But yes, when uh Alan Rickman, Steven Spurrier, he's very like, well, California wines. I'm like, come on, this is like another rung below the ladder, but this will probably gain a lot of publicity and maybe help my shop in the end. That's why he's doing it. But Jim's son Bo thinks differently. He secretly believes their Chardonnay is good enough to compete internationally. Now, a young graduate student named Sam Fulton arrives seeking an internship in winemaking. Jim immediately puts her to work doing hard manual labor. Sam adapts quickly and becomes interested in the vineyard operation as a romantic triangle develops. Beau is attracted to Sam. Gustavo Bramblia, the vineyard foreman and talented Mexican worker, also likes her. And this is played by Freddie Rodriguez, by the way, who is, we'll talk about him, but I think he's my favorite character in this whole movie. For sure. Now, fun fact Chateau Montalena's 1973 Chardonnay, uh, the one that won The Judgment of Paris, was from, in fact, Sonoma, from purchased fruit, not from the estate vineyards in Napa of Chateau Montalena. So Jim Barrett had purchased the property just in 1972 and planted Cavernet Sauvignon. While they were waiting for those vines to mature, which takes two to three years before any vine, any newly freshly planted vine, is going to produce grapes good enough to make wine with. So during that time, Mike Gergich, the actual winemaker of Chateau Montalane at the time, suggested they buy Chardonnay grapes and make wine white wine that was ready to drink now to keep the cash flow going until the Cabernet was going to be ready. But after winning the judgment of Paris, They soon also planted Chardonnay on the estate. And today, Chateau Montalena is mostly known for their Cabernet. It's true, just as Jim Barrett intended, not necessarily their Chardonnay, even though a bottle of that 1973 Chard is still sitting in the Smithsonian. And you can buy some Chateau Montalena Chardonnay. Uh it's probably about $60 a bottle for their Chardonnay. And you're looking at like 90 to 100 plus bucks for a bottle of their Cabernet today. Also, fun fact. Sam states in the movie, quote, Well, dirt was good enough for Al Lovering Tubbs in 1882 when he went and bought 250 acres of the stuff, right? Unquote, when she's referring to Chateau Montalena in the vineyards there. Jim Barrett purchased the chateau in 1972, but it was it was originally founded and planted by the Tubbs family. The winery is still on quote unquote Tubbs Lane. And that Tubbs family, I gotta say, I'm gonna I'm gonna brag this my humble brag. It is my maternal grandmother's family. I'm wine royalty, y'all. Now, fun fact also, though, I had no idea about this before I when I became a wine nerd. There wasn't why I became a wine nerd. No one in my family was into wine. No one really drank much wine. Like, you know, they drank it like they went to an Italian restaurant. They would buy the um a Chianti, you know, kind of a thing. And like that Like they like wine, but they were not wine people. I knew nothing about wine. I fell into it, fell into it in my really middle 30s, like kind of all on my own steam. And then once I was into it, my mom was like, huh, you're really into this. And she was like, Did you know? And just one Christmas just sort of dropped this bombshell that once upon a time, we, the Tubbs family, my my maternal grandmother's family, they found they planted all the vineyards. Like they were the ones who made Chateau Montalena a vineyard and started all of that. Um, and they sold it shortly after Prohibition, I think, because they didn't really, you know, obviously Prohibition wiped out everything vineyard-wise. Um, though they didn't rip up the vineyards, or maybe they did. Actually, I'm not 100% about that. Anyway, a little bit of my own family history. That's the end of Act One and the end of the fun facts. Dallas, what do we think of Act One of Bottleshock? Had you seen this movie before? No, I had not seen this film. Uh I heard about it because I love I I I love anything that features God, I always forget his name. His name is Severus Snape. Snape now is Snape. Alan Rickman. It is just Snape in my mind. And I hate those films. Okay. uh but He's always Hans Gruber to me, but or Sense and Sensibility. I love him and Science and Sensibility. We did an episode on Sense and Sensibility, by the way. My favorite romance movie uh in Dallas's was Romeo and Juliet. We did a twofer on those two movies, so go check them out. that was about yeah, two how two Valentine's Days ago, something like that. yeah, yeah. I think it was last year of Valentine's Day, so twenty twenty five February of twenty twenty five. Go check that out. so anything with this guy in it, I'm I'm gonna watch it because he's just fantastic. And it really pisses me off that he's not here and I can't write for him. but no, hadn't heard of this film. I of course knew what the Judgment of Paris was, but um this film was just not on my radar, had heard nothing about it. I think I'd seen a poster around the time when we first started the podcast. because of a rabbit hole a um sideways rabbit hole I went down. Um but nah had no connection to this this film whatsoever. How about you? And what'd you uh yeah yeah yeah. So I'm hadn't seen it in quite some time. I'm I'm not a rewatch person, right? Yeah. We just did Once Upon a Time in the West and I mentioned how I'm like, I own this movie on digital, quote unquote own this movie on digital because I loved it so much I'd seen it once. Yeah. And then that was my second time seeing it. So I just don't re-watch movies very often, if at all. It's like special occasion kind of a thing. Cause just like with wine where I want to taste every wine under the sun, I rarely go back to the the same wine twice. I don't go back. I want to watch everything. I want to see most movies that are made. I'm so curious about them. And there's so many hours in life in in a day. And so it's like, why would I rewatch something if I remember the experience well in my head? It's another thing if I've seen something and I'm like, I literally have no memory. Like, I know I saw it and I cannot picture a single scene from it, hardly. Like maybe I have a snapshot of the of the movie. And it's like, okay, that's worth revisiting because that there's no if you don't have a a a true memory of something, did it actually happen for you? You know, and so you need to do it again. Uh but if I have a clear memory and I'm like, yeah, I love that film. I can like think of most of the scenes in it. There's no reason to rewatch it. I mean for in my head. I know that's not how most people are. But this movie I'd seen, I think only once before, but I remember really liking it. I'd seen it I I think I re I think this was back in Netflix physical DVD mailing to you days. And I think they I had them mail it to me and I was like, this is great. I th I w and I wasn't that I wasn't into wine then. It was just a total lark of a, you know, biopic type thing. I wasn't sure what it was gonna be about. I just knew it was Alan Rickman, Chris Pine, Bill Pullman. I was like, what is this cast? And so I I grabbed it and I liked it a lot then. It does not really hold up. It needs to be said. There are so many elements of this movie that are very dated and feel indie ooze darling. Um it's one of those movies this was four years after Sideways. Um sideways was 2004. This one's 2008. And it's one of those movies that seems to have taken all the wrong lessons from Sideways. Like all the wrong elements of why Sideways worked so well. And I think there's a reason this movie really didn't make leave a mark or make much of an impact at the time. And part of that is that everything in this movie is a caricature. Yeah. At all these like everyone is dialed to 11 at all. Including the wig times. Including the wig. Including the wig. Chris Pine's wig, guys. You gotta see this movie for the hair that Chris Pine sports in this. It's It is as atrocious and overbearing as any lady wig you have ever seen in an older movie where it's like they're all wearing wigs. And it's like, this is the most like that hair does not fit on that face. You know, like at all. It is so outrageously off. But but he sports it and he just has a gale time doing it. He works the hell out of He's in it. Um, but you know, Bill Pullman's at 11 the whole time, Chris Pine's at 11 the whole time. Yeah. You know, one of the reasons I like Freddie Rodriguez is Gustavo, is like he's the only one that has even a little bit of nuance and like steadiness to his performance. Whereas everyone else is just like this is by and Alan Rickman's doing Shakespeare in this, like a very dialed down Shakespeare, but right. But he's being like the asshole British guy. And there's uh definitely an element where um I don't remember if Alan Rickman was ever on record. I wanna say there was an interview where he said like he never. Met Steven Spurrier. He didn't he didn't tried not to watch any archival footage. Like he didn't want to ape the guy. I I want to say there's an interview where he said that, but don't quote me on that. Um, but he's definitely not. If you've ever seen an interview with Steven Spurrier, like this is not that guy, this is not that performance. This is a character made for this movie. And that's my problem with it. Is every we mentioned in the history that there were the two people from Snowba County that like wrote an original screenplay. They brought it to these two Randall Miller, and I'm forgetting who his co-writer was, but they were like, okay, that not that draft. We're gonna write our own draft. And they wrote this like a little Miss Sunshine nonsense out of it, where it is that like feel-good indie oh's movie where everyone's a character now and sideways, these your main characters, um Miles and Jack. They're assholes to begin, or they're they're they're they have these extreme eccentricities to begin with. But as the movie goes, you start to peel back the layers and see what's underneath. And they have to learn how to dial back their own eccentricities to get anything that they want out of life. And like the point of that movie is to go beyond that. And this movie is like, nope, that's what makes a great character. And go, go, go. So it's fun in that way, but this movie is free. Fruity. My that is that is the word for me. very it's also very flat to me. It's also very a very flat sort of dramatization. I get it. And w and when I say that, I mean that in uh l like you said, to your point, everyone sort of dialed up to ten the entire time. And that is a very sort of it's one note. It's a and the note is ten. You know? And uh i it's a little flat for me. It's a little empty and act one makes me think maybe a single varietal, uh, you know, something that's just a pure single expression of a grape that doesn't necessarily change or go many places or um open up much. Um not to say that I disliked it, because it does have a at least Act One definitely has uh there's an aspirational thing to it, naturally. Because of the narrative, the story they're trying to tell, right? It's the old world versus the new world. It is, you know, the old palettes, the old tastemakers versus these guys who are out in the middle of nowhere in a desert near the mountains of California in the new country, just plucking away and doing their thing. And uh, you know, that sort of confluence and that sort of um intersections on the horizon. So that's entertaining and naturally there's some stakes and drama there, but Uh Act One, I'm Okay. Yeah. I I I agree with that. Act one moves weirdly fat fast. Like you're just going from one scene from one place to the next to the next. It gets to Napa Valley fairly quickly. Yeah. You start meeting all the people really fast. And yet there's very little energy. You know, it's just sort of like things just keep happening. The performances are again fun, but there is I mean, there's even this thing where it's like the the younger crowd, um Chris Pine, Freddie Rodriguez and Rachel Taylor, the the Bo, Gustavo, and Sam. Like, you know, they get in there, like, they're fighting truckers and going to bars and dude. Like, there's all this weird nonsense that you're just like, I mean, this, this, it almost, it's almost like a weird 80s throwback in a lot of ways, with a very OOs feel. But when you look at the general makeup of the script and the story and the characters, like everything is like. And then I I mouth off and get into a fight to show or or you know, when it's then Sam like flashes the police officer and you know and then the cop gets out and it's like oh I there's so many things then we box to like make uh me and my dad box to like uh settle arguments and I'm a hippie and he's a d there's just there's so much that is it's all it's got that 80s extreme quality to it. It has a lot of weirdo. Yeah, it's weird because it is the retelling of an actual story, but it has a lot of like stock character energy to me. Um honestly that's probably it may be what they decide, you know, how they decide to sort of approach the story, you know. Um but clearly. Uh but in terms of like but in terms of like an actual script. I mean apparently it it it it's just feel I could find the original script. That would be nice. That's actually that would be interesting to compare. Right. Now the people who wrote it, we don't know. I apparently I'm not even sure they were writers. So it could very well be that like that could be worse than what was written after. Like we don't know because we've never seen the original script. But this one as a script is pretty wanting. Yeah. Yeah, agreed. And and you know, I know Act One has the has the very tough job of again onboarding us into this you know, this quasi real event, at least according to uh the narrative of the film. and it it just leaves me wanting more, which means it lowers the bar for. So actually no, Dave, I'm sorry, that was my bet. I did not ask you what you were thinking about why. Look at me, jump in the gun. Yeah, in terms of wine thinking, like I mentioned Fruity already. So this movie's very fruity. Um, I was definitely thinking something that I think for me, I really wanted to stay on theme with the New World versus Old World, Old World, The Judgment of Paris. maybe you know, Chardonnay, Cabernet, maybe if it was gonna be a Cabernet or a Chardonnay, I wanted it to be from a new world area, so not necessarily California. I was thinking more like sh you know, a Chardonnay from another country that's now decently known for Chardonnay, Cabernet from another country. So like a Patagonian Chardonnay and a Chilean, you know, or Argentinian Cabernet Sauvignon, or maybe a South African Cabernet Sauvignon, something like that. You know, Australian, something of that nature. But the fruitiness of this film, like this is not, it's not super deep. So the wine was either going to counter. The simpleness of the script by being more dimensional than it was. And that's where I was thinking I needed to lean. It's like, okay, maybe the wine is gonna be the thought provoking part of this pairing. And the movie doesn't require much of us. Just just watch it, just let it play. And you could walk away for five minutes, come back, you miss nothing important, you know? And You know, I w I should probably hold off on this thought until the end, but I'm gonna just go ahead and say it. This film also There's such a great film actually in this idea that it almost angered me that this was what was released. I mean the fact that the judgment of Paris doesn't even happen until like the last ten minutes of the movie. Right. And then it's just like sped through and you're like, What are we doing here? This is crazy. Like Good like reading the the documents about what happened on the day and how everyone was approaching it and how nervous everyone was and how people were trying to it was just it sound honestly it sounds one hundred percent. It sounded like the kind of, you know, p a foppery, a sort of like what's the a clue kind of energy. There is this weird with these descriptions, you know what I mean? Like the it was just this This event that had never taken place before and you had the old world versus the new world in one Saying this should have been like an Olivia Coleman comedy. Yeah. ah Should have been one of the judges. Yeah. Actually, it's about time for another um well yeah. Yeah. All right, anyway. the fiftieth anniversary or would have been the year to do it, but it it's come and gone. It's coming gone. Um maybe even and one thought I had, especially in terms of the wine, maybe having to pick up the slack of the movie, is the script was really bothering me throughout the entire opening act. And I was like, what if it's by what if the winemaker was a writer? Oh no. And I knew they were a good writer. Nice. Nice. And so that's where my thinking was there. All right, let's get into act two and then we can follow up with More. I like it. I like it. All right, act two guys. Hold on to your tits. Okay, cut that part. Spurrier tours Naple wineries and begins tasting California wines. Initially skeptical, he becomes surprised by their quality. At Chateau Montalena, Beau secretly gives Spurier bottles of their Chardonnay after Jim, the dad, refuses to officially participate. Spurier is impressed enough to include Montalena in the Paris competition. Meanwhile, Jim's financial troubles deepen. The vineyard is heavily in debt, and banks are pressuring him. Jim becomes obsessed with ensuring the vintage succeeds because the future of the winery depends on it. Meanwhile, Beau continues clashing with his father, which crescendos when Jim finds out that Beau gave their wine to Spurrier. He tells his son he's essentially fired, and has to figure out what he's going to do next because he's not staying there. Gustavo is also seen as making a very small lot of his own wine, having purchased grapes from another vineyard run by a fellow sympathetic Mexican vineyard owner. The wine is turning out transcendent. But Gustavo fears what will happen if the Barretts find out he's essentially becoming competition. Though Gustavo simply wanted to try his hand at this, he'll need to sell it to be able to make another vintage to pay for the batch of grapes, but he's not out seeking to compete. Just yet, per se. Nevertheless, Jim finds out and refuses to even try Gustavo's wine and also fires him. He couldn't afford to keep him anyway. Later, Gustavo convinces Sam to try the wine. Blown away by the experience, she kisses Gustavo and the love triangle shrinks to a straight line. Beau comes by the next morning to pick up Sam, finds them together, and in a rage drives away, leaving her there. Fun fact in 1976, Gustavo was the cellar master at Chateau Montalena, working with Mike Giergich. He was one of the first American Mexican American graduates from the UC Davis Oneology program. While the movie portrays him as a close friend to Bo Barrett, in reality his role was more focused on the scientific technical side of production at Chateau Montalena. Following his success at Chateau Montalena and a later long tenure at Gergage Hills, Mike Geerg's winery, Brambilla, that is Gustavo, of course, launched his own label, Gustavo Wine. Montalena Girge wines and Gustavo wine all still exist and make amazing wines to this day. All right, what do we think about? All right. So at this point, I mean, I was the love triangle thing was was kind of fun, totally beside the point of everything. I mean i Yeah. I mean it's one of the things that there's even the scene that we left out of the synopsis here where uh Chris Pine's bow goes to his mother, who's remarried or at least is with another man, like you know, divorced from his dad, and basically gets the money to rescue the winery. Um, to pay some of the debts and just drives Jim Barrett to in a rage. And it's just like Jim Barrett, uh I know they had Bill Pullman in mind for this role, but I'm like, do you think all he does is scream? Apparently. Okay, it's all this character does, and he's just the most like emotion Jim Barrett is in this movie the most emotionally unkempt individual existence. Like he's j yeah, he's just nothing but rage and No. Great wine, but I don't want anything. I want everyone to give me everything I want and never anything I don't want. And anything, step out of line, or don't do not be wherever I want you to be at those. I mean, it's just one of those things where it's like, dude, calm the fuck down. You're making as many mistakes as anyone. Like, calm down and just like work with people. And I he's just terribly written, terribly written. And he's The one and only person that wanted to work on this fucking movie and give his likeness and whatnot to it. And I'm just like, wow, they do him dirty. And the he wasn't even a winemaker. So they like made up again. This movie creates drama when there doesn't need to be drama. The drama is so inherent in what's going on. You have the culture class of the bri of the British coming over and meeting the Americans and finding the Californian wine. I'm sure there would be some um Politics going on in the cellar and in the vineyard and whatnot that could play into that. You have Sam as an intern that could sure throw a monkey wrench into certain things. Maybe there's a love triangle. that's fine. But this is so like dirty dancing levels of dramatization. It's actually. Um parts of it, especially when Bo went to like the ex the the mother and like and they were at the fine dining place and he was the hippie long-haired vineyard guy and didn't fit in. It felt it was so dirty dancing in the way they tried to portray that. And I'm like, dudes, dirty dancing was like 20 years ago. We need to evolve our storytelling here. So there's just so much drama heaped in in this second act that is all unnecessary and beside the point and histrionic and not well played. And again, it's kind of funny. This is just such a movie you can turn your brain off at. And I guess they succeeded in making a wine movie you can turn your brain off, which is no small feat in certain ways. but at the same time, it is a shame because this could have been so much better. So, yeah, for me right now, I think my thinking, I definitely wanted a wine. I had a wine in mind that was going to be by a winemaker who He's not uh, you know, he doesn't write screenplays or anything, but he's written two books now. And he's one of the best wine writers. They're books on wine. He's a winemaker. Okay. And I've read like his turns of phrase and the way he constructs a paragraph have just blown me away. I actually messaged him once and I asked him about his background. He's like, yeah, he had like a philosophy degree and an English degree in his background. And he's like, before he decided to pick up the family business and become a winemaker himself. So he's yeah, that that's where I thought I wanted to go. And I worked hard on that before, you know, coming back into wine. But man, he's just good. And then the kind of wine he has fallen in love with and makes the most of and promotes is it fits this movie for a couple of reasons. I'll I'm I I I'll well, okay, I'll I'll reveal what it is in Act Three, but for now I'll tell you that it is it's the red wine I think should have become the California red wine instead of Cabernet Sauvignon. Okay. I think it and it's the one he believes the exact same thing. And he's like, This should be the red grape of California and especially the place where he's at and making wine in California. California. Good title. And he is also in a part of California that was one of the great award winners in that eighteen eighty-nine World Fair of Paris. Uh that this area of California is only just now kind of getting some notoriety again. So all of those reasons really make it fit. And again, I really wanted something fruity. He this grape is fruity but also astringent. And it's that blend of the two. And so I think that fits perfect. With the Alan Rickman astringency and the Jim Barrett astringency. And there is something astringent. As fun and as turn your brain off as it is, the thing that rubs against you, there's this astringency. I think in the wine it's beautifully balanced, and in the movie, it's kind of not. Um, but that's where the wine comes in and helps you out to get through this movie. Anyways, your thoughts on act two here, Dallas. What evolved for you? uh I I had difficulty pairing with the film itself, so uh because I I sat the in the entire time I was watching it, I was rewriting it. I was yeah, you know what I mean? I I was like resketching it, I was it's the entire thing because it upsets me that you have everything for honestly, like a a a sort of a new world epic, right? You've got the backdrop of a new frontier that w you know, it's it's the wine world of California coming into its own and making a claim and looking back to its parentage and saying, Simon Dad, we're better now. You know what I mean? We're we're different, we're better, whatever it is. We've do we're doing our own fucking thing and it's just as good. It can stand up. So you've got that, right? As the sort of backdrop. You've got the generational thing, um, with the son and and the the the the the father. You've got Gustavo's indigenous kind of roots, right? And the idea that not only uh is he, you know, skilled in this because of a a familial background, but this is the land of his family as well. And you know, you've got this sort of the idea of these, you know, these this white family just showing up and sort of buying some land. We're gonna do wine, people, you know, that kind of thing, which is also another note, right? You've got all They wanted to find drama, right? Right. It's there. And there's a little bit of that in this movie. And it starts to creep up and especially with Gustavo and Jim. There's that tension where he basically fires him for trying to make his own wine. And Gustavo's like, Yeah, but you were never gonna let me make my own wine. So like when was I going to do and I needed to have a job while I tried it out and got my feet wet. And it's like so there is that tension where it's like You know, even though the business is apparently crumbling, which makes no sense. He bought the property in nineteen in one year ago. Like it may it kind of makes no or a couple years ago. It's like it's happening so suddenly that I feel like again the movie's kind of drumming up this drama. But some of that's there, but yeah, it could be it could have been explored so much deeper and much better. On top of that, you have which is the most interesting to me, is the you know, these sort of plebes out in the hinterlands going to the royal court, right? Going to the royal court. French de Vant. Exactly. And uh it just such missed opportunities. Again, there's a little bit of that. Like when when Chateau Montaline is about to win and Rickman runs over to Bo and he's like, Do you have anything nice to wear? Go put it on. Yeah. Right, right, right. So there's a little bit of comedy in that, but it's uh again the judgment of Paris itself is like ten minutes of this movie. Right. It's wild how fast it is. And it ha and when I was watching it, this is only my second time seeing it, I remembered it. I cause I I was not a wine nerd at the time, so I didn't know the real story behind it. I realized it was based on a true story and I'm like, this is really cool. And I loved watching this the first time. Knowing the story now a bit better, it was stunning. I'm like, are we still in California? Right. When when are we when the fuck are we getting to the actual judgment of Paris? And some of the the drama and all that stuff and the characters, I was like, ooh, it felt more you know, I was watching this probably around like the early 2010s. So this was not that old then. This was maybe four or five years old at most. And now uh twelve, you know, 10 to 12 years later. I'm like it's starting to feel oh so it's starting to feel very dated at this point. Yeah. Yeah, no, I agree. Um so wine wise, um I I'm just uh I'm going off in a different direction. I'm looking, I'm trying to like find things that uh interest me. And what interests me about this film uh is this connection between old world and new world and sort of coming together in this one moment, because that's essentially kind of what the judgment of Paris is, even though it's a competition. It is these two worlds meeting formally in an environment that is uh you know recognized by the industry, by the, you know, the clientele, the customers, you know, and both sort of just digging around one another and, you know, whatever happens, happens. And uh so I'm looking at a wine that is a convergence of old world and new world and possibly Even the Vintners themselves. The story of how they got to wine. And there's a very I already have the wine in mind by the time we got here. So uh the bottle, um i it is a combination of Italian, French, and Australian, and American. Um, so yeah. That's all I'm saying now. All right, X three, let's do it. Act three Choo chip. When Bo arrives at the winery, he discovers his father in disarray. The Chardonnay has turned murky brown in the bottle. All of it. Jim believes the entire vintage is ruined, though it tastes normal when Bo takes a swig. Devastated Jim orders all the wine destroyed and hauled away for dumping. A toddler, as we already said. It's like instantly, like no, let like let's look into this and see what Throw it all away. I know. But unable to accept defeat, Bo takes the wine to viticulture uh a viticulture specialist and discovers the discoloration is temporary, a result of having created the wine too perfectly without the slightest exposure to oxygen, and will naturally clear up within a day or two. Bo and Sam drive frantically to recover the wine before it's destroyed, but run out of gas. They unsuccessfully try to flag down passing cars until Sam finally flashes a police officer to get help. The officer is torn between duty and boobs, but boobs went out and he assists them. Bo discovers the local bar owner Joe, played by Elisha Dushku, by the way. All the women in this film seem to have boy names, it's interesting, intercepted the supposedly ruined bottles before they were destroyed, before she intended to recycle the glass. So the bottles are saved and the vintage survives. Jim reluctantly accepts that Beau may have been right, may have been right. He even suggests Beau go to Europe to represent the Napa winemakers at the event being hosted by Spurrier, which the other winemakers agree to. The movie finally shifts to Paris for the famous wine tasting competition. Prestigious French judges confidently expect French wines to dominate. California wines are treated almost like a joke. Spurrier organizes the event carefully while worrying whether his stunt will backfire. As scores are tallied, it becomes clear that Chateau Montalena Chardonnay has defeated the elite French white wine. Spurrier somewhat hurriedly tells Beau to go change into something nice. He's going to need it. When the results are announced, three California wines in the top five spots for the white wines at least, and Montalena in number one. The judges are stunned and outraged. Back in California, the Barrett family and Nepal winemakers hear the news. At first they can hardly believe it. Then reporters and wine buyers begin flooding them with. Calls and orders. The victory transforms Napa Valley into an overlooked farming region from an overlooked farming region into a globally respected wine destination. Epilogue Spurrier and Maurice at the Academy Du Vant. They are still no there are still no customers, as now Spurrier is a pariah amongst the French wine world, having just allowed California wine to dominate them. But he remarks how this has opened a door that can never be closed again. Roll credits. What did we think about this ending? I I the ending is as rushed as it is, it does work. I think the ending is the how do say this. I think short film, the whole movie should have just been. Precisely. It was the weightiest thing about the entire film. It was the most interest honestly was the most interesting thing about the entire film. Even the epilogue, the relationship between Dennis Verena, uh, by the way, hats off to Dennis Ferena in this because he's he's yeah, he's playing a d against type because he's always someone's, you know, uh like Italian mafioso or some mafioso adjacent. Uh so hats off to that guy for this. but yeah, the epilogue I think is kind of perfect. It's weirdly perfect. Uh i it would it would fit for an even grander film, I think. Yeah, the one I have in my head now. You know. Yeah, the one you would rewrite. Yeah. Absolutely. Agreed. Um, I will also say true uh unlike real life or unlike the movie in real life, Napa really didn't pick up on this news for a while. Um it it more stunned Europe. Um I think it then hit the E as all things do. It's Europe, then the East Coast. Yeah. And then slowly trickles down. And like Napa Valley didn't start touting this for a little while. It was one of those things where um one of the things that's remarked about. In articles written about the judgment of Paris is how long it took Napa to like get their shit together and like take advantage of it rather than, you know, that night after after after the event, here's the press and here's all the everything. Anyway. Um, so yeah, this ending for me works really well. Um, most of it did. Even the whole like weird thing with the the wine turning brown, which also not really like they they it's overdramatized more than it actually needed to be. But it does work as an 11th hour, but uh to some degree, it's like they came up with one more thing to not do the judgment of Paris. I'm like, why are we still in California? Stop making up shit and go to France. God damn it. Um, like just be on a sound stage. You don't don't film in France. I get that. That you don't have a like you're we're not gonna film anything in Europe. Like, we don't, you know, so we're not gonna do that much. but just go on a sound stage. I don't care. do something. No no one in America knows what France looks like. It's all good. Just film it somewhere. That's right. especially back in the oh's. No, I'm I'm I didn't know what France looked like. I'm sure plenty of Americans do. But this works really well. The judgment of Paris, uh as quick as it is, works. So for me, I'm sticking to my guns on this. And you know, a question I have for you, Dallas, if you had to pick. Two wines besides Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon that should have become the flagship wines the white and the red for California. What should they have been instead? Jesus Christ. Or should they have been Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon? Um that's a hell of a question. It's honestly it's like Holy crap. You mean just in general or the of the of the ones on uh it that were sort of making the cut? You could say, well, think about what's made the cut now. And like should should two of them have even then maybe been the ones to sp spotlight and and blow up? No, I'm I'm not even gonna pretend that anything other than those two make sense for me because of course my my knowledge is is is is uh is more limited than yours in sort of the depth of the wine field of this time. and I mean they make sense to me. I i it may not answer the question, but somewhere in there, I'm sure someone would laugh at this, but maybe an Albarino. Okay. Okay, fair. Maybe maybe just because it's i it it just does so well in the in in California. Um yeah. Uh that's a hell of a question. Wow. I've never thought about Well, for me, this is gonna answer which one I paired it with, at least the red wine. The white wine I would pick, I think my number one white wine that I think should have come would have been Shannon Blanc. Oh. I think it's so much more consistent everywhere in California as making just beautiful like it Chardonnay is such a what exact s w what what is your exact vinification methods? What what exact style of it? And Shannon Blanc takes so much more while remaining beautiful and complex while still being just like no I've never found someone where I've poured them a Chenon Blanc and they're like, ooh, not for me, which is just not true for Chardonnay. Okay. So is that the is that the sort of criterion that the its expression Not necessarily. Okay. No. But Sauvignon Blanc, I think, would have probably been the more likely culprit, and I still think would have been better than Chardonnay here in California, because it does rich styles, it does light styles in California, and it is really even the rich styles of of Sauvignon Blanc coming out of Napa Valley right now. Like you describe it to me on paper, and I'm like, that's not the kind of white wine I want to drink, and yet it is. When I taste it, I'm like, Oh, yeah, that's rich, but that's beautiful. Okay whereas rich Chardonnays are often not. Like they are the thing I don't want to drink. So Sauvignon Blanc or Chenin Blanc for the whites, and then for the reds, I gotta say it's Cabernet Franc. I think Cabernet Franc should have been the grape for two reasons. One, it's the grape that they struggle to get ripe enough in Europe. It's why it's more of a blend, or at in Bordeaux, it's why it's the blending grape in Bordeaux. it's a blending grape so much more often in Super Tuscans in Italy, in um where but in California, Cabernet Franc, it is the where you get Cabernet Franc tends to be the Loire Valley in France. And I'm not a fan of that. I know plenty of people are. I think I'm missing a sensory taste bud. Um it it tastes like dirty water to me. It's too delicate and light, and just like there's nothing going on in that's pleasant in the glass. Um, but people who like Loire Cab Franc, they are blown away by it. So I think I am literally missing, you know, an el a an element of taste that they are getting out of that. So a certain taste bud, whatever it is, that is missing like I taste under all those other like the other flavors that are going on in there. And so it's missing that cohesion. And I'm like, wow, I've yet to taste a single Loire Cab Franc. And yes, especially Chinon wine nerds. I can I've never had a Shinon that I haven't wanted to spit out. Um but new I can I c I I can concur on this. I I can absolutely Okay Yeah for sure. Okay. New world Cab Franc, though, it has it you get it riper. It has the fruitiness, and which is why it's gonna match this movie as well. The fruit is there, but it's not too much, it's not overpowering, it doesn't become the alcohol bomb as often as Cabernet Sauvignon does. And that green bell pepper astringency that balances out the fruitiness uh is more prominent in Cab Franc often than in Cab Sav. And it comes through in the New World wines, it's like the best of both worlds. You get the ripeness that California reds are known for. You get that astringency and complexity and earthiness and minerality that European reds are known for. And it is just this beautiful, beautiful thing. Now, the Livermore Valley in California is the place that is right now trying to make Cab Franc like the red wine grape of the Livermore Valley. Back in 1889, they won the World Fair of Paris for a Sautern style dessert wine that they were making in the Livermore Valley. And that was their huge claim to fame at the time. And back then we even called it a sautern because there were no rules and we were allowed to. Um, so it was a quote-unquote sauterne that won the World Fair back in 1889. But these days it is the Stephen Kent winery, and winemaker Stephen Kent, he loves the Cab Franc grape and thinks it is like the greatest grape in existence. Definitely wants to make it the red grape of the Livermore Valley. Probably thinks it should be the the red grape of all of California. He inherited his winery, uh kind of sorta. His dad had ran a different brand winery. they sold that and then had to rename their winery. He's actually Stephen Kent Miracle is his full name. And the Miracle winery was the one that sold. And then he had now it's the Stephen Kent winery, is the one they still own and make their own wine with. And that's the one where Cab Franc is their flagship grape. And they do this really cool thing where they do every year they release a Cab Franc and they release it aged in wood, one aged in rock, and one aged in steel. And then one called Elements that's a blend of all three. And you can get all four and taste them side by side. And it's the same vintage. The same Cab Franc from the Livermore Valley, same vineyard, and then they're all in these different aging materials to see the exact difference that makes. And then elements, of course, that perfect blend. For sure. I have I have all four bottles sitting next to me right now. So yes. This is why we work well together. And they're gorgeous. They're fruity, they're complex, they're layered, they have minerality, they have that nice green bell pepper astringency, they have earth, they have spice. It's just Kapsov can have all of these things as well. Um, and the old Mirasal winery he used to work with, his family winery did was mostly predominantly Kap Sov. That was their claim to fame. And when he first founded Stephen Kent Winery, their inaugural release in 2000 or 2001, I'm forgetting now. I drank it a while ago. I got it on Winebid. I got their flagship Cabernet. They started with Cab Sov. They weren't doing Cab Franc originally back in the OOs. And it still drank a it held up better than the Coppola wines. It was Amazing. It drank it like you could tell it had it was well aged, but what it had lost nothing. It was amazing. And so, but Cab Franc is what he's put putting. He's like, This is the future for California and definitely for the Livermore Valley. So I want I want a world where Cab Franc is is what Cabernet Sauvignon is today, where more people appreciate it, more people understand, especially New World Cab Franc. Um and then either Savion Bonc or Shannon Bonk, if you're gonna do a white guys, do that out there. Yeah. I I like the Shinnan. Yeah, that's true. I could see that. Yeah. It's rare to come across. alright. So as I said by the way, by the way, sorry, I I forgot. Stephen Kent, writer. He I I have his book called Lineage, where he just tells his story. And it's just a family story. It's very simple. It's like as a wine book, there's no there's nothing about it that like is gonna be gripping or thrilling or anything. And motherfucker can write a pest sentence. Like it is just flowing passages that you're like. This should be boring me to tears and it's not. This is amazing. Um and y it sucks you right in. He's an amazing writer and I wish he wrote this screenplay. Yeah, fully. anyway. Uh go check out that book, guys. any of uh Kent's books in fact. Lineage, Stephen Kent. All right. Uh so as I said, I'd had a bit of difficulty kind of working into a pairing for this, so I decided to kind of go uh a little uh against type, a little left field, and um pair with the experience of the Paris judgment or judgment at Paris, which is this sort of convergence of old world and new world. And uh, you know, as alluded to in the last few scenes of the film, as you s we said in our synopsis, our character is sitting at the table and there is no new business in his uh Academie Divine. But he says that this is just the beginning. Pretty soon We're gonna be tasting Chardonnays from and he goes through the list of countries that we now get. Yeah, we now get great. Um and one of those countries he mentions, of course, is uh Australia. and you know, this film is hinged on the American relationship. So I wanted to Find a wine that is sort of the convergence of old world and new world, not only in terms of the grapes and the parentage and expressions, but also in terms of maybe the narrative and the story behind the Vintners and the creators themselves. And my pick is the Domain Terlato and Chaputier, which is a collaboration between legendary French Australian wine grower Michel Chaputier and wine industry icon Italian American Anthony Terlato. the Chaputier family have been working in their own valley since 1808. Their ancestor, Polydor Chaputier, was the first to buy vines there, shifting from being a simple grower to making and trading his own wines. And not unlike our guy here in California in this film. And now that pioneering spirit is visible seven generations later with Michel Chaputier. And Anthony Tony Terlado was the chairman and founder of Terlado Wine Group, who indelibly influenced the American wine industry and culture for over 60 years with his work with the Pacific Wine Company and Rutherford Hill. We have the 2019 Terlado and Chaputier Shiraz. Um, you can't see that, but we'll have pictures for you, of course, on the Substack. You should always check out the Substack. in terms of the they they are really interested in The uh soil, of course, the terroir, the it's composed of schist, of course, and limestone and quartz. The harvest is performed at maturity, usually two weeks later than neighboring plots, to avoid overmaturation. Uh 100% destemmed grapes are fermented in concrete tanks. Maceration lasts from four to six weeks, and a gentle extraction is uh commenced by pumping over. And a long maceration on skins ensure elegant and fine tannins. That's all from their website, of course. Go look it up. 100% of their wine is aged for 18 months in French oak barrels. in terms of the color, it is de it is deep and dark and intense and nice and bloody, and there's even some violet in the Right light. Again, I've had two glasses, so it may just be my vision at this point. Uh lots of great black fruits in this. there's even a floral, like uh violet-y kind of nose. there's some anise or licorice. Uh, it is really velvety. Really, really, really, really velvety. There's also some smoke, of course, and that uh tobacco adjacent thing, which I can never quite. identify, but I think it's tobacco. I think it's a to ba tobacco kind of uh note, leathery maybe. and I think it's fantastic. Uh I've gone through three fourths of the bottle, hence my mumbling and stumbling over all the words tonight. Uh and I fucking love it. It is the convergence of the old world and the new world with our Italian American and our French Australian Wine makers and It's a world like coming to like a big blend of all these different um places and it's coming from a new world area. Uh it's Shiraz, which is Syrah. It's the exact same grape, just what the Australians call it. So it is another noble grape kind of transplanted over to a new world area. So yeah, and I've I've had a lot of those Toralto and Chaputiers. They're great. They rich so drinkable. All right, guys, go find go find one of those. Also check out Stephen Kenton winery. You can go buy from them direct online. They have, if you're in the California area, I don't think they've gotten out of California yet, but certain parts of California, they've gotten their wines in Vaughn. So they have a Cabernet Franc Blanc, a white version of Cabernet Franc, where you just don't use the skins. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. We've we've had this, Dallas. We've we've had the one you yeah, yeah. You came over and we drank almost like the whole bottle in like one say it was so stupidly drinkable. Um so they have that. They have, of course, the elements, the the um the wood, rock and steel, and then the elements, and then they have some higher end if you if you if you can afford it. They then have like their high end cob francs, which are properly California priced in that like seventy five to a hundred.$35-ish dollar type thing. But you know, the elements, that's like $55. So it's not, it's not cheap, but it's not stupid priced or anything like that. You're all in that sort of like I think even the Cap Franc Blanc is like $30 or $35 bottle. So everything that they do is gonna be in that like $30 to $60 bottle. And then you get to the high end stuff. So check them out as well. And you know what? Do check out Bottle Shock. If you've never if you do not know the story behind The Judgment of Paris, it's highly fictionalized. But it does end the way it ends. It is the characters are roughly who they're supposed to be. So you can go watch it. It's a fun late O's romp um that you can turn your brain off with. And the cast is kind of amazing. So it's worth seeing. And Freddie Rodriguez is Gustavo. Honestly, uh we didn't talk really about Rachel Taylor as Sam, but she's another one who is like I was I Yeah, I mean again, these characters are not written well. They don't they're not given much to do. But what they're given to do, like these actors are given it their all. They're really trying to make something of this. So I was impressed by Yes. All right. Thanks so much for listening, everyone. We hope you enjoyed this full deep dive into Bottle Shock. And be sure to join us in the upcoming weeks as we tackle that. Other wine movie from the OOs. That's right, we're finally doing a baby Sideways. It's coming up soon. And then we're gonna cover the reason we're covering Sideways, is then we have to cover the sort of satirical sequel to Sideways. Did you know this even existed? It just dropped last month on streaming. Napa Boys. With returning guest Decarceration, the man who spent 10 years locked away in an American prison and now watches and reviews all the movies he missed while away on his substack. He has been a guest with us before, where we did these fake wines paired with fake, I'm sorry, fake drinks paired with fake movies. It was a two-parter we went so long. This one's gonna be a one-parter. I promise. I promise. I'm gonna I'm gonna force him. it's gonna be a one-parter, but he is gonna come back for that. And then another returning guest. We're going to hit one cut of the Dead, a true love letter to low budget filmmaking, which we'll be tackling with Mark screenwriter Mark Palermo. he was on when we used to do music and comics and all these other things. He came and did a Carly Ray Jepson album with us. And finally, he's a screenwriter though. So we like he had to come back and do a proper movie with us this time. So and he has another podcast, Movies and Chaos, that we love and I got to be a guest on. So he's got to come back and be a guest on us, on our podcast. So he penned, he wrote one of my top five five films of all time, 2012's Detention. Go check that out if you have not. If you don't like it, that's personal failing on your part. Now, before we go, if you love what we do here, we ask only one thing, broken down into about 12 sub things. Follow and subscribe to us. That helps us grow, gets us in tight with all the algorithms, and also tell a friend or fellow Cinephile or Owenophile about us, especially if they're. Both. That's gotta be like a few dozen of us crazy bastards out there. So for fuck's sake, if they should be listening to the one and only wine and movie pairing podcast in existence. So Cinephile, Oenophile, or even if they just kinda like movies and kind of like wine, who knows? They might dig this. Maybe you dig this and you're neither of those two things either. Let someone else know. Even better. And to endear yourself to our even uh more no no no no no no no no. Even better. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. That's what I test. uh Even better. And to endear yourself even more to our completely self-obsessed hearts, go follow us on Substack. Just go to Vintertainment Studios.com where you can interact with us, find bonus wine and movie pairings, and also make sure to check out our wine cellar cinema, our new microcinema built inside a wine shop here in mid-city Los Angeles. Our first night of short films, each paired with the wine, is set for June 19th. Yes, Juneteenth. And tickets go on sale next week. Week spots will be limited as we can only fit so many people into a wine shop. So head to wine cellarcinema.substack.com to get notified for all our wine cellar cinema events. And many thanks to our sponsor, Curated Wine Shop. No idea where to begin finding a wine that pairs with your movie? A des OK. Almost literally no one does. But curated is here to help. They accept every vendortainment-inspired challenge and will curate the selection to match your palette. Just tell them what you're trying to pair with, your budget, your preferences, and they will. Show you the way. Curated is a boutique wine shop on LaBray Avenue, Mid City Los Angeles, founded and operated by Peeps, currently and previously part of the entertainment ecosystem. Johnny, Kelly, Allison, and Mia, they're all fantastic. Go meet them. They carry an ever-changing, wide ranging selection of small lot artisanal wines from the known and comforting to the completely unique reds, whites, roses, oranges, sparklings, dry wines, sweet wines, and everything in between. Go check them out if you're in the LA area. And by the way, they are the wine shop. Where wine cellar cinema is built. So if you're interested in that, definitely check them out. You can find them online, curated dash wines.com. They do ship, even if you're not in Los Angeles. That's curated dash wines.com for curated, ventertainmentstudios.com for us of entertainment bros, and wine cellarcinema.substack dot com for all things wine cellar cinema. Thanks so much for listening. We will be back in one week with another wine and entertainment pairing fo yo v entertainment. Ciao for now. Later guys. It's the sunlight, it's the rain. If you don't get it, I don't know how to explain. It's more than just time in a bottle. Give me each summer in a bottle. It's laughter. Through tears, it's memories I've piled high throughout the years. I save them for when I cannot down. And if it's time I'll move on a sketch down, but I'll keep each a minute in a bottle. Give me each a bottle. It symptoms laughter by a fire. I know you felt it to that deep stirring of desire. All the good things you feel before they're gone. If you bottle them, then they Can live on so you don't forget the faces or the places you don't wanna let go. I don't wanna let go. Do you wanna let go? I don't wanna let go. It's each moment that you cease carpe de amor whatever you please Some day I'll find a little spot of land. Be proud of the vintage I make with my own hand until then I'll collect so when I'm old I can resurrect each summer, each season, each sunset. I will keep them all in a bottle. Give me each summer in a bottle. It some Charlotte will be remembered as the driving force, I'm gonna say that again, the driving force behind Pinot Grigio's skyrocketing popularity with US wine consumers. Is it skyrocketing right now? well, as it was at the time of this article. Oh okay. Um but in general I think it's holding steady. I think Pinot's holding steady, um for sure. but why you do you know something contrary to that? Is it is it waning? Is it is Pino, yeah, P oh Pinot Grisho is like persona non grata. Are you kidding me? on, impossible, no way. No, no, it's got a h terrible rep. Every it's like it's ta it's tasteless w it's tasteless slop is what most it's kinda like going through a Merlot moment. Yeah. It's like no one likes it. All right. I'll buy that. All right. If he's wrong, tell him guys. If I'm wrong, don't tell me. Anyway.