Sideways (2004)

I came across this mellow, sometimes self-satisfied but often touching, comedy the other week when indulging in my very own glass of pinot noir. I quickly realised just how limited my vocabulary is when it comes to wine. Sideways, the surprise success of 2004 from Alexander Payne, has a plethora of adjectives at its disposal when the theme returns (as it consistently does) to this subject. Wine is at its cinematic heart; in fact, it often feels like the film itself might be tipsy as it rolls through the Californian valleys with Miles and Jack (Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church). The general atmosphere throughout is one of dreamy intoxication and, despite the odd 'drink and dial,' it's undoubtedly a pleasant world in which to briefly indulge.

Miles is the kind of character life likes to gently deflate: he is middle-aged and divorced, two of the things struggling writers, whilst constantly complaining, masochistically enjoy. He is also a wine fanatic and passes off his alcoholism as a refined academic pursuit, knocking back the glasses at various vineyard tastings with comments like 'there's just the faintest soupçon of asparagus' (hopefully not). On the other hand, his best friend and companion on this asparagus-infused stag week is Jack, a serial womaniser and sort of-actor, terrified of settling down with his rich Armenian-American fiance. They make an odd pair, and Giamatti and Haden Church play wonderfully with this dynamic, particularly at the moments when Jack has to respond to one of Miles' many woeful monologues. The scene where Miles bemoans the fact he cannot possibly commit suicide before he's even been published (to which Jack responds: the guy who wrote 'Confederacy of Dunces' killed himself before he was published) is priceless.

Along the way on their oneophilic voyage, the two men meet Maya (Virginia Madsen), a beautiful and quietly intelligent waitress, and Stephanie, a wild single mother played by the always brilliant Sandra Oh. Whilst Miles attempts to connect with Maya through the art of slightly patronising but beneath the surface touchingly vulnerable conversation, Jack wastes no time in starting an affair with Stephanie in a bid to live life to the full before his wedding. Inevitably, these couplings lead to moments of hilarity, heartbreak and tenderness; occasionally all three simultaneously, and Payne creates moments of wonderful subtlety in his exploration of two men of a certain age struggling to commit.

It gets off to a slightly slow start, but no doubt, as Miles says contemplating his glass of swirling red, we just have to let it settle. The cinematography certainly helps with this: California is shot in all its heady, sundrenched glory by Phedon Papamichael, and it's very hard not to google winetasting trips on the west coast as soon as the credits roll. But you don't, partly because you've already got a bottle chilling in the fridge, but partly because this film is ultimately at its most effective when its characters, not its places, are at the fore, stripped to their funny, fragile selves not by the devilish influence of drink, but by each other.