| Fresh Food | Jonathan Nossiter's Mondovino, |
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| Fresh Food | Jonathan Nossiter's Mondovino, |
More Gremolata * Contact Gremolata * Subscribe to Gremolata (it's free) * About Gremolata * Ontario Wine Agents | ||
| Gremolata; gremolada: [greh-moh-LAH-tah] A garnish made of minced parsley, lemon peel and garlic. It's sprinkled over osso buco and other dishes to add a fresh, sprightly flavour. (Source: Food Network Encyclopaedia) | Gremolata's Malcolm Jolley reviews Mondovino: Mondovino was first screened in Cannes last year and made it's North American debut last fall at the Toronto Film festival. Since then it has been released in Europe and the UK, as well as in selected U.S. cites, like New York and Los Angeles. After Sideways, this has been the must-see movie for anyone remotely interested in wine. As a result, when I was recently asked to a press screening of the film, I went into the theatre having read quite a bit on it. And from what I had read, I was ready for an argumentative film and, perhaps, ready argue back. If you've been following the press on Mondovino, then you know that at its heart its a call for the return of terroire-based, small production wine making. If you imagine that Michael Moore was a Frenchman and - I suppose by definition - an oenophile, then you can get a feel for Jonathan Nossiter's movie. Big corporate nasties like the "flying wine consultant" Michel Rolland are given yards and yards of rope with which to hang themselves. Old World wine oligarchs who make global production labels from Tuscany to Bordeaux to Argentina are exposed for having old familial ties to fascist regimes and say incredibly stupid things to the camera about how Mussolini wasn't all bad and made the trains run on time, etc. And New World winepreneurs are Nasdaq-fueled carpet baggers like the Mondavi's or turn out to be a former assistant to Henry Kissinger (I'm not making this up) who, many years after SALT I, parlayed his dot.com bubble winnings into a Napa "garage". These people do not come across as charmingly as the old French geezers in Wellies. More darkly, Nossiter also goes after American uber-critic Robert Parker, but in a rather underhanded way. He won't attack Parker head-on (or perhaps Parker is too smart to get caught in one of Nossiter's interview traps). Instead, he goes after the wine makers who have benefited by Parker's high ratings, suggesting the Wine Advocate is a monolithic American corrupter. Then, he insinuates guilt by association when it is revealed that some wines rated highly by Parker have been made in consultation with Rolland, and in fact the two are friends. All of this would have been easier to swallow had Nossiter acknowledged that Parker's great region of interest, and the origin of the wines he has most consistently and passionately championed, is the Rhône. Indeed, a terroire that Parker brought to the American wine collecting world's attention nearly thirty years ago. This omission is dishonest and cheapens the film's defence of terroire. But it would be a mistake to dismiss this film as simply anti-globalisation/consumerism/micro-oxygenation tract. It is genuinely amusing, and the heroes are wonderful characters who wax lyrically about the dignity of their wines and the importance of their land and tradition. Then, of course, there is the scenery. Nossiter drags his camera across seven countries and shoots each bucolic countryside and fabulous chateau with iconographic zeal, even as his subjects deconstruct these myths of paradise. It's a pleasure to watch: a wino's eye candy.
Bottom line: go see this movie when it opens in Toronto on May 27th and enjoy it for its passion, if not its objectivity. | Gremolata Books:
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