At Sunday night's Southampton premiere of the feel good movie "Bottle Shock," the name of a certain cinematic crowd pleaser that boosted business for pinot noir as it creamed commerce for merlot was invoked several times, so resonant was "Sideways" to public taste for wine. "Bottle Shock" recounts a seminal moment in 1976 dubbed "The Judgment of Paris," a blind wine tasting that declared the supremacy of California wines over the prevailing French, opening the door for West coast wines, as well as, say, those of Long Island and elsewhere. This film will whet appetites for wines of complex notes and woodsy nose from all parts of the globe. Chardonnay should go through the roof.
The title refers to a kind of jet lag, as bottles move through time and space: an equally cool title could have been "the little vineyard that could." Fortunately for the opening night crowd, a tasting was in store. The stars Bill Pullman, Alan Rickman, Freddy Rodriguez, Eliza Dushku, and Rachael Taylor joined director Randall Miller and writer Jody Savin for the post-screening party at Savanna's, featuring a 3-course meal with wine pairings by Domaine Chandon and Newton Vineyard. Riedel's stemware and decanters provided just the elegant touch for diners Marty Richards, Chuck Scarborough, Itzhak Perlman, Monte Farber and Amy Zerner among them. I had a chance to chat with Eliza Dushku of "Buffie the Vampire" fame whose character in the movie is a barkeep who saves the day. Clad in a gold and black vintage gown, she is soon to star in her own television series for Fox as well as another movie by director Randall Miller, "Nobel Son," shot prior to "Bottle Shock," to be released this October. Miller said he was attracted to father-son dramas. While "Bottle Shock" could not be more different, at its core is the story of Bill Pullman's character and his son who spar onscreen. It's a rite of manhood and Bill Pullman perfectly evokes the prideful, down on his luck father. A confession, I never understood how Meg Ryan's character could leave him in "Sleepless in Seattle." In "A League of Their Own," I understood Geena Davis' character leaving baseball when he returns from war. And, when Sandra Bullock's character falls for him in "While You Were Sleeping," I was already there. Equally fine in theater as in the romantic comedies for which he is known, Pullman performed on Broadway in Edward Albee's "Who is Sylvia? or The Goat" and more recently in "Peter and Jerry ," and wrote a play that was produced in San Francisco. Informally at dinner, his face is extraordinarily expressive as he enthuses about working on "Bottle Shock." In one pivotal scene, lacking a corkscrew, he assails a bottle with an unsheathed scabbard. The bottle was scored, he told us, and at first the top just flipped over limply instead of flying off with gusto. What a guy!
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Posted by: MARIEMcintosh18 | September 15, 2010 at 11:56 PM