Wine in the cinema

Wine has conquered overseas and European feature films, finding in each one a different and always original connotation: from a bourgeois and refined drink, a little snobbish to be enjoyed on special occasions and tables, to an intellectual and cultural element, capable of marking the moments of the life of a company. Among the Italian films masterpiece of the relationship with wine are “Miseria e Nobiltà” and “Il Compagno Don Camillo”. In the first, a 1954 film directed by Mario Mattoli, Totò's companion in misfortune embarks on a concise but effective organoleptic analysis of his favorite wine. In the second film directed by Luigi Comencini in 1965, wine seems to take on a political dimension when it demonstrates the close, daily relationship between the people and this much loved product. But even American cinema, when it looks at Italy, is able to grasp different aspects of the relationship between wine and society, as in “The Secret of Santa Vittoria”, a 1969 film directed by Stanley Kramer. The film tells the story, which really happened, of the inhabitants of a small town in central Italy who, after the armistice of 1943 and during the Nazi occupation, did everything to hide the assets in bottles of wine from the social cellar from the occupants. A sign of a very deep bond between people, the places they live and the products they draw from their work. Countless, then, the settings related to wine that are the background to the stories told for the cinema. In the 1995 film “Scent of a wild must” by Alfonso Arau , the story takes place in a sunny vineyard on the hills of California's Napa Valley, where a family of Mexican winemakers has been producing wine according to tradition for three generations. Memorable is the scene of the harvest where wine, a cultural vehicle of identity of the Mexican peasant tradition, emerges in a disruptive way with all its engaging and magical sensuality. A truly intense sensory and festive experience, which crosses the screen and brings the aromas and scents of wine directly into the spectator's living room. In Alexander Payne's “ Sideways , traveling with Jack” (2004), wine is the leitmotif of an ironic and reflective comedy. One of the protagonists, a man with a refined and witty culture, a profound connoisseur of the wine lexicon, explains to Maya his love for some varieties, in particular Pinot Noir. The film engages bottle after bottle as California's wineries and vineyards open their doors to the actors. In the film "An excellent vintage" by director Ridley Scott (2006) the protagonist is transported on an intense journey to discover himself and his roots that he will discover are linked to wine. He rediscovers his true nature and recognizes himself in the values that his uncle had taught him, the same that have belonged to the culture of "making wine" for centuries: sincerity, passion, respect for nature, for the land and for the seasons.