Must-see: our TOP 5 must-see films about wine

Wine-making is often considered an art in itself. So when wine finds its way into a film scene, we are witnessing a mise en abyme of artistic expression. There are many instances of wine, vines and viticulture in cinema. They are used in the service of a narrative, dramatic knots or staging. We took a closer look at the films made around wine. Here, we take a closer look at five films that can be enjoyed without moderation, and whose narrative takes on the wine industry... to the delight of all our wine-lovers!

Sideways (2004)

Synopsis 

Alexander Payne's film is about a recently divorced struggling writer, Miles (Paul Giamatti), who takes his actor friend Jack (Thomas Haden Church) on a Californian wine tour of the Santa Ynez Valley for his stag party. But the two men don't have the same expectations for the trip and don't see eye to eye on their schedules. While the perpetually anxious Miles wants to relax and enjoy the wine, the seductive Jack is looking for one last fling before his wedding. They meet Stephanie (Sandra Oh), a seductive waitress who Jack falls for, and her friend Maya (Virginia Madsen), a sommelier with whom Miles strikes up a friendship. When Miles lets slip that Jack is getting married, the two women are furious, putting the whole trip in jeopardy.

Wine and wine tasting are the common thread running through this restrained film, with scenes set in the natural surroundings of vineyards and wineries, at the heart of a journey of initiation against a backdrop of male friendship. It's a dramatic comedy that could even be described as a feel-good movie, with a quartet of funny, endearing characters. Enjoy it like a fine vintage.

Nominations and awards

• 7 Golden Globe nominations
• Best Film of the Year at the Washington Area Film Critics Awards, the San Francisco Film Critics Awards, the Los Angeles Film Critics Awards, the New York Film CriticsCircle and the Boston Film Critics Awards.
• Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor (Thomas Haden)
• Oscar for Best Screenplay for Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor.

The angels’ share (2012)

Topic

In Glasgow, Robbie, a delinquent and young father, is sentenced to a community service. He narrowly escapes prison and vows to turn over a new leaf. A visit to a whisky distillery inspires him and his friends to look for a way out of their desperate lives. He discovers an innate talent for recognising great whiskies and decides to make the most of it. Ken Loach's film focuses on spirits and takes its title from a natural phenomenon that can be observed in the cellars: the evaporation that occurs when a spirit ages in a cask.

Nominations and awards

• Nominated for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes International Film Festival
• Jury Prize at the Cannes International Film Festival
• Nominated for Best Foreign Film at the Césars 2013.
• Best Actor for Paul Brannigan at the BAFTA Awards 2012 in Scotland.
• Best Screenplay for Paul Laverty at the BAFTA Awards 2012 in Scotland.
• Audience Award at the San Sebastian International Film Festival 2012

Saint Amour (2016)

Synopsis

Every year, Bruno (Benoît Poelvoorde), who is a bit of a drinker, takes the wine route... right through the heart of the Salon de l'Agriculture (Agricultural show) ! But this year, his father Jean (Gérard Depardieu), a cattle breeder who has come to present his champion bull Nebuchadnezzar, decides to renew his relationship with his thirty-year-old son. On a whim, he takes his son on a wine tour, unexpectedly bringing along Mike (Vincent Lacoste), a young taxi driver. And while they toast together to Saint-Amour (a Beaujolais wine), they will soon be toasting to love in its purest form, between fine vintages and all the women they meet along the way...

This film by Benoît Delépine and Gustave Kervern puts wine and viticulture in the spotlight through the protagonists‘ love of wine and the French vineyards that served as the backdrop for the characters’ jaunt. The directors filmed in French vineyards in the Languedoc, Bordeaux, Beaujolais, Pays de Loire and Rhône-Alpes regions.

It's a funny, moving film that's intoxicatingly tender, with a trio of actors who are just right, even in the most comical situations.

Distinction

Saint-Amour was selected out of competition at the Berlinale in 2016.

Ce qui nous lie (2017)

Jean (Pio Marmaï) left his native Burgundy and his family ten years ago to sail around the world, his desire to set sail firmly anchored in his heart. On learning of his father's imminent death, he returns to the land of his childhood. There he meets up with his sister, Juliette (Ana Girardot), and his brother, Jérémie (François Civil), to whom he has given no news for four years. Their father dies just before the start of the harvest. On the family vineyard, as the seasons change and the work in the vineyard intensifies, difficulties emerge, forcing the siblings to reinvent themselves and find each other again. For Jean, it's time to make a choice: whether or not to embrace the transmission of this family heritage and invest himself in the business.

For his twelfth feature film, Cédric Klapisch set up his camera for a year in Burgundy, following the rhythm of the seasons, in the Côte d'Or, all along the Côte de Beaune, from Chassagne-Montrachet in the south to Prémeaux Prissey in the north. The harvest scenes were shot in Meursault on the estate of Jean-Marc Roulot, the winemaker who plays the role of cellar master in the film. The family estate in the film is located in Chassagne-Montrachet. Morgeot Abbey, a little way from the village of Chassage, played host to the cast, particularly for the paulée scene. In his film, the director also evokes organic viticulture through the protagonists he pits against a non-organic winegrower. The film ferments human feelings and fraternal relationships and offers a veritable ode to Burgundy winegrowing.

Distinction

For this cinematic cuvée, the filmmaker was named ‘personality of the year’ by the Revue du Vin de France in 2018, which wanted to reward ‘a film that presents wine in a light that is both aesthetic and profound’.

A good year (2006)

The story

After years without news of his uncle Henry, Max Skinner (Russell Crowe), a British investment broker, learns that Henry has died. He inherits his uncle's château and vineyard in Provence, where he spent much of his childhood learning maxims and how to win and lose, particularly at chess. Intending to sell the property, Max travels to France and spends a few days at the estate renovating it before the sale. He discovers a new, relaxed lifestyle. His plans are disrupted by memories of his childhood, a beautiful woman (Marion Cotillard) and a young American girl who claims to be Henry's illegitimate daughter. Did Max the boy know things that Max the man has forgotten?

Ridley Scott's film centres most of its narrative on a wine estate that symbolises a whole past avoided by the protagonist. Château la Canorgue in Bonnieux, in the heart of the Luberon Regional Nature Park, lends its walls to the estate inherited by the protagonist, an estate that will be the catalyst for the character played by Russell Crowe to return to the values of his childhood.

The sommelier's crime - Vinodentro (2014)

The plot

Giovanni (Vincenzo Amato) could have pursued a career in banking, but his love of wine led him to take up œnology. He devotes himself to the art of tasting and identifying exceptional vintages. His new devouring passion gave him self-confidence and success. He gradually became the most renowned and respected wine expert in Italy. He is in great demand, and his social rise is meteoric, until the day he is suspected of murdering his estranged wife Adele, and ends up at the police station. Everything points to Giovanni. Then, in the course of an investigation in the heart of the peninsular vineyards, the veil is finally lifted on the origin of his excessive passion for wine. The commissioner in charge of the investigation uncovers an astonishing truth about the last three years of Giovanni's life. The audience discovers how he sold his integrity to ensure his success.

Adapted from the novel by Fabio Marcotto, Vinodentro sets its story in the heart of the vineyards of northern Italy, in the beautiful region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia. It offers an analysis of human nature through the benefits but also the devastating effects that a passion for wine can produce.

Supporting film-making

Winegrowing has always been associated with human culture and traditions, and has always been a source of inspiration for the cinema. Indeed, there are many examples of films in which wine, the vine and everything that revolves around it are used to create powerful moments between the protagonists and become veritable social symbols. Wine unites the characters, and its cinematic potential has seduced a number of directors who anchor their narrative and their mise-en-scene in a vineyard or around a wine tasting.

Whether in the form of a bottle shared or tasted alone by the protagonist, preferably a famous vintage to create a sense of complicity with the audience, or via the setting of a vineyard and its vines, a real contextual environment, directors find in wine a pretext for an encounter, a trigger for the atmosphere or an extra who influences the behaviour of the characters or even sets the tone for a scene. The strong bond that exists between wine, viticulture and cinema is not about to break...