The 400 Blows + Parallele 45 (2006), Paul Jaboulet-Ain

This misnomered essential French New Wave film details the life of juvenile troublemaker Antoine Doinel. It is a semi-autobiographical story by director Francois Truffaut, displaying both the self-centered, lackluster involvement of authority-figures in Antoine’s life, as well as the agonizing injustice of having some wraith semblance of adulthood forced on him at an early age. Auteur scene to watch for: Overhead shot as the gym teacher takes the schoolboys on a run through town, losing them in droves as they abandon him for other interests.

Just as The 400 Blows was mislabeled (the French title derives its name from a saying about deviants; the literal translation unfortunately stuck, suggesting a film perhaps about extreme physical punishment), so also I’d like to think that this wine has a more complex subtext than its geographical latitude plainly indicates. Simplified nomenclature aside, this wine blended Grenache and Syrah in a pleasing 60/40 mix of red fruit and granular texture.

Kyle | Film: 7, Wine: 6.5
Nate | Film: 7, Wine: 5.5

Kill! + Oroya Riesling (2006)

Things aren’t really as they seem with the film. The setting is in feudal Japan at the height of the samurai, but the music clearly comes out of the spaghetti western era. You have a wandering yakuza bum that used to be a samurai, a farmer that wants to be a samurai, and then the actual samurai that just want to kill everyone else. Assassination, betrayal, power, honor, and revenge are all re-imagined in Okamoto’s parody-like samurai tale.

At first sniff, this white wine delivers like a Moscato: all the elements of honeysuckle and exploding white floral aromas on the nose. You can practically smell copious amounts of sugar cane, and swear that it’s going to be a delicious dessert wine, but then you taste it. The wine pulls a doublecross – either because it’s a Spanish wine posing as Japanese, or perhaps because your mouth is still reeling from the wasabi and soy sauce that you doused your sushi with. No harm done. It’s still a tasty Riesling, and if anything the nose really accentuates the full-bodied flavor

Kyle | Film: 7.5, Wine: 7
Nate | Film: 6.5, Wine: 6

The Passion of Joan of Arc + Beaujolais-Villages

This silent film made in 1921 is one of the most picturesque ever made, all the more beautifully enhanced by the “Voices of Light” accompanying soundtrack. The film composition is so calculated that you could take any single frame and make it into a movie poster. Maria Falconetti runs the gamut of the emotions of anguish, terror, resignation, complacency, defiance - all with her fiercely articulate eyes.

For this film we chose a simple wine, such as one that you would imagine the peasants of a small European village sipping in the 15th century. And when we say sipping, picture a heated French debate over how to eradicate the English from the land. Then throw in a dash of heresy and some powerful female resilience, and you can’t go wrong with this combination. This is a light red wine that starts soft and blends well with the film’s simple sets and ominous abuse of religious power.

Kyle | Film: 9, Wine: 6.5
Nate | Film: 9, Wine: 6.5