Review: Corked
by Eric Golub
I had the pleasure of seeing an independent film named “Corked,” a movie that satirizes the pomposity and smugness of the culture of Sonoma Wine Country.
As somebody who does not drink alcohol, does not go to independent films, and does not drive my car outside the West side of Los Angeles (it’s an old car), I forayed into Downtown LA to watch a “mockumentary“ where adult beverages were served.
I will spare you the elitist, flowery rhetoric about how it pops out of the bottle with energy and flows smoothly until the viewing palate is pleased. I remember seeing a commercial where wine tasters exclaimed, “Splendid clarity. Excellent Nose.” I wanted to smack these people, and also wanted to know if Hollywood celebrities could have a form of rhinoplasty that would enhance their wine drinking sensation.
In pure, non-aristocratic terms, this movie is funny. It is very funny. Try to picture Eugene Levy in “Best in Show” mating with Jane Wyman in “Falcon Crest.” (Please think of this in a G-rated manner. Ms. Wyman was Mrs. Ronald Reagan for heaven’s sake.)
This movie skewers the arrogance behind wine tasting. While it is not overtly political, it absolutely lacerates wine snobs, with politically incorrect humor that would please anybody with a pulse, much less a palate.
Virtually none of the characters have redeeming qualities. One wine honcho wears a tuxedo to the vineyards, while failing to understand why the Mexican workers dislike him. Another wine owner runs a one-man operation, falling asleep on the job from exhaustion. Another wine top dog is the son of a Texas billionaire who just wants his son to stay out of trouble. The marketing team are condescending racists trying to market wine to minorities.
Everybody in wine country wants to please Mr. Parsons, a tuxedo-sporting wine aficionado and critic that makes the late Mr. Blackwell (Hollywood’s worst dressed list) seem warm and fuzzy. Mr. Parsons decides who gets to win the “Golden Harvest Award.” The Golden Harvest Awards are very similar to the Oscars, in that virtually nobody outside the industry cares, but the narcissistic participants think that the fate of the free world hangs on their every move.
The brilliance behind Corked is producer Brian A. Hoffman. (Full disclosure: I know him. If I would have hated the movie I would have just kept my mouth shut.) The movie took him over three years to make, but on a shoe-string budget he has really hit one out of the ballpark. The characters are well fleshed out, and the dialogue is clever.
The movie should be watched twice, once just for laughs, and a second time for political junkies. At no time does a single political issue or politician get mentioned, but those who believe in political correctness get to have their beliefs stomped on like the sour grapes they spew. (For those who care about the rights of innocent fruits and vegetables, no actual grapes were harmed in the making of this movie.)
For those of you in Los Angeles, head down to the Downtown Independent Theater on 251 S. Main Street. The show is running there through June 11th. For everyone else, the Website spills all. To those who are too elitist to traipse into neighborhoods where commoners exist to watch lesser known actors, the solution is simple. Drop the pretenses, lighten up, have a drink, and go get Corked. You’ll be glad you did.
eric aka the Tygrrrr Express
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39 Comments
I love wine but the wine snobs are a real pain.
Like Bruce, I really like wine as well and am looking forward to seeing this. I actually loved "Bottleshock" even though it was not a particularly faithful rendition of the Paris Wine Tasting it was a fun movie to watch and had a great soundtrack. While I can appreciate the difference between nose (the aroma of a wine) and finish (the aftertaste) wine snobbery is a target rich environment and I have a hunch this will be hilarious.
Heh, perfect. I've recently become a wine drinker (for the health benefits, of all things… and now I actually like the stuff). Since I only drink one glass in the evening, getting a bottle would be kind of pointless, seeing as how the stuff goes bad after three days or so. So I started buying boxed wine because it keeps much longer. When I asked about boxed wine at World Market, boy, did the snobbery come out. "We don't sell that here, sir". What's funny is that I've read several wine critics that have essentially said that the boxed stuff is pretty good, but the sniff-the-cork crowd simply won't have it. This film is for you, corkers.
Wow, Eric, you talk at length about the arrogance, pomposity, smugness, racism, elitism and condescension of people who drink wine. Perhaps someone who does imbibe should have written this review. A bottle of wine can cost $10 or $1000 – it need not be elitist or stuffy. I hope you realize this and were just writing for effect, not because you really believe everyone who dares analyze a glass of wine is a stuffed shirt.
I have a sense of humor and I'm sure I'll dig the movie. Just go easy on us wine geeks. It's a lot of fun for us.
Love wine. I particularly like 2009 Vintage Guinness……
I have family members who are wine drinkers of the sort Mr. Golub describes and believe me if it wasn't for the Guinness (and a couple shots of Jameson) taking the edge off when they start talking about wine I "would" have to kill them!
I do actually like wine. It's just that decades of Big Macs and Burrito's have ruined my taste buds. You could serve me week old Ocean Spray grape juice and a Chateau Lafite and I wouldn't be able to tell the difference………..
Snort! Sounds like a good film. Speaking of which, wasn't it Thurber who drew a cartoon about a wine snob who held up a glass to his guests and said 'I hope you will admire its pretensions.'?
BTW – this is GREAT having a venue where I can find out about obscure films. Thanks again for the tip.
I know just the person I will take to this film..my partner. OMG I want to reach across the table and double smack him when he and his wife launch into their wine-a-logue. We are invariably treated to the list of meals that they've had and the countries where they've been…blah blah! I look over at my husband and he's fighting having his eyes roll to the back of his head…and of course I burst out laughing barely holding in the spray of "delicious, fragrant, bold, brave, blah blah" …you get the picture.. Corked it is!
gotta agree. i thought the show Frazier did a nice send-up of the pretentiousness of wine snobs, with several shows' plots revolving around Frazier and Niles and their wine club, et. al.
Aha and Bravo! Another Jamison fan. I'll bet, like me, you have had your share of Irish Car Bombs in your day (for the unitiated, it is not unlike a boilermaker with the difference being you actually drop the entire shot glass of Jamison's into your tankard of Guiness. Another favorite is Jamison and Irish mist (the irish version of a rusty nail.)
I'm sorry to say it was 40 years of smoking which killed my sense of smell and some of my taste buds.
I've been lucky to have a buddy who does collect California Cabs. What I have noticed are some of the wines really do taste exceptionally good, but like most things in the material world, the price for the best gets bid up well beyond what most of us would consider reasonable. With most red wines, if one actually had the patience to let them sit for ten years, they do noticably improve because the tannins soften (the tannins are what gives a red wine the pucker factor so to speak.)
This was a real fun review.
"I remember seeing a commercial where wine tasters exclaimed, “Splendid clarity. Excellent Nose.” I wanted to smack these people, "
That one had me laughing.
Thanks. Not sure if we'll get this in Tokyo, but one never knows. I mean, we have a master sommelier as well as a robot variety!
This was a real fun review.
"I remember seeing a commercial where wine tasters exclaimed, “Splendid clarity. Excellent Nose.” I wanted to smack these people, "
That one had me laughing.
Thanks. Not sure if we'll get this in Tokyo, but one never knows. I mean, we have a master sommelier as well as a robot variety!
Well, Guinness is the wine of the beer industry. Seriously, you have gotta love Guinness, esp on tap.
So, we are out to dinner with my cousins; I love the guy (can you believe his name is Corky) and he has a cellar with 2000 bottles, all very expensive and very very tasty (really).
So, as you know, you CAN"T drink red wine with fish,right?
I order it everytime just to see how he handles it.
He doesn't.
Is that WRONG of me?
Hilarious…you should really get under his skin and ask for Franzia next time.
I saw one of these wine snob d-bags at Olive Garden of all places.
All these years of drinking Guinness with a shot of Jameson and I never heard it called an "Irish Car Bomb"! I have to get out more often!
I guess I really shouldn't harp on "Wine Snots", I'm just the same when it comes to beer. I'll probably be killed for saying this, but I absolutely refuse to drink domestic beer. Given the choice between having a Budweiser or nothing at all, I'll go with nothing. So I'm just as bad….
After you drink Guinness, Stella, Morretti's, Watney's and even the bargain bin Red Stripe for so many years it hard to pick up an Old Style and enjoy it.
You are absolutely correct on the red's though. There is nothing like a nice bottle of red (preferably Italian/ early 80's $$$$) with a good meal. Beer or Soda just doesn't cut it…..
Sidenote: You live in an absolutely beautiful part of this country. It doesn't suck to be you!
What was he doing excatly? The Olive Garden is not exactly a place where I would think Wine Snobs would congregate…
Your taste buds grow back. My dad quit smoking cold turkey after a heart attack several years ago; however, he has become far more picky in his tastes since his taste buds have grown back. My dad used to be a very bad chain smoker since he was 11 years old. His clothes & the house used to smell of smoke. It was awful given I have asthma.
I prefer wine over beer. I'm not being a snob, but I have never developed a taste for beer! I have tried beer several times & still find the stuff not very tasty to my senses. Wine is good for its fruity, warm taste. However, I have not even touched wine in over a decade…
hey Bruce – with wine there really is no right or wrong, it's what YOU like. On the other hand, if you continually do it only to piss your cousin off, I'd say why? Most wine, at least to me, has some positives. If you haven't tried that many whites, you should, particularly in the summer when you might want something crisp, light and refreshing. It's probably the same reason people like light food dishes such as fish in warm weather. There are a lot of really tasty inexpensive varieties such as Albarino (Spain) Muscadet, and Picpoult (France) that my local wine merchant got me into. Modern techniques of wine making are such rarely does one need to spend more than $10 or $15 to find something extremely tasty.
Hey what's wrong with Olive Garden. Millions of Americans enjoy paying $7 or $8 for Progresso from a one gallon can and microwaved meatballs………………..And let's not forget wine from a keg!
Not really a hotbed of foody's or wine connoisseurs.
That movie Sideways epitomized the pretentious wine snobs. I like wine but I am in no way a wine snob..I also love an ice cold corona sometimes.
*snerk* In a box.
Good whites all come from Germany..Reisling, ice wine, Piesporter, and Spatlese..Of course there are some really good Pino Grigios also. I've discovered that wine doesn't have to be expensive to be good.
Hi Sarge – I don't know if ALL the good whites are German, but you sure are right that they are really good. I hesitate to food pair since we have a tough crowd this afternoon (all in good fun I trust) but I think Reisling is tough to beat when you are having turkey.
Nothing is wrong with the Olive Garden; I eat there quite often myself. However, I wine snob seems to be out of place in the Olive Garden…
It kinda was a joke! I haven't eatin there ever since A building engineer friend of mine took me on a "behind the scenes" walk through of a large shopping mall he runs. All the stores where closed, but he needed to get into "The Olive Garden" resturant to check a water alarm, so I had a little look around! When I said Progresso in one gallon cans, I wasn't kidding. I was awestruck at the low quality of the food products used!
Gordon Ramsey would have pissed himself if he saw what I saw……………
But you are right about the wine snob. If your pitching a snit about wine in an Olive Garden, brother you've got more than a few issues!
Wine will keep in the bottle in the refrigerator–not that I'm a total wine snob. I leave that to my sibling!
As I am not necessarily an indy movie fan (unless someone I know is in one or has made one) I thank you for your assessment of Corked. I'll watch it and think of my sibling whose approach to wine is much different than mine. Mine: "Let's see. I'm having steak. I like Syrrah, Merlot, and Gamay Beaujolais. What am I in the mood for today." Sibling: "Let's see. I'm having steak. Hmmm. What year is that? Oh 2003. Well, the prevailing winds off the coast of Africa drifted ever so slightly north that August….blah blah blah. " I love my sibling but please…..It's like when said sibling tried to "teach" me the appropriate way to drink a beer. I grabbed the beer, opened the bottle, took a swig, said "there ya go." I like simplicity. All of this pontificating over stuff that gives you a slight buzz for awhile then passes from the body like all other liquids, I just don't have the time for. I guess I'm just not a Baccus worshiper.
." Sibling: "Let's see. I'm having steak. Hmmm. What year is that? Oh 2003. Well, the prevailing winds off the coast of Africa drifted ever so slightly north that August….blah blah blah. "
Holy Crap that 's funny! That's my brother you described……………
Tank,
Saying that all good whites come from Germany could be seen as anti-Semitic Holocaust denial by politically correct people. Luckily I am an anti-PC conservative that just laughed. It reminded me of when Vince the Shamwow guy said, "We all know Germans make great stuff."
I wonder if all good reds come from Massachusetts.
eric aka the Tygrrrr Express
Beamish is better.
The movie itself may be great, but the trailer on their site makes it look absolutely awful! As for reviews, The Hollywood Reporter agrees with Eric that it's excellent, Variety says it is a little lame. I'll be interested in seeing it myself to see who is right.
"Are you chewing gum?!?" My favorite line in "Sideways."
I know people who speak with that kind of reverence and incredulity when us heathens drink wine with them. When I'm reminded of that line in it cracks me up every time.
Eric, that's JMO of course.
I keep trying whites but to no avail. But I will give the ones you recommend a whirl. Maybe I will find one?
Thanks for the suggestions.
Wine and beer are not mutualy exclusive…enjoy them both either on a casual or more intensive level…who cares?
Are we related????
[...] in LA, I could go see a screening of the new indie movie, Corked! (IMDB), which I read about at Big Hollywood. And I chose the metaphor I did, because the massive pretensions of the wine industry are the [...]
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