I didn't like Mondovino (as with Michael Moore's films, my problem is not so much the ends but the means), so I've been negatively predisposed towards Jonathan Nossiter. But I enjoyed much of this three-part interview, which made me want to read his newly released book Liquid Memory. But I'm not sure about the movie he is making about my beloved hometown, Rio de Janeiro...
http://reignofterroir.com/2009/09/14/mo ... odynamics/
http://reignofterroir.com/2009/09/23/jo ... -dialogue/
http://reignofterroir.com/2009/09/29/jo ... -portugal/
One of my favorite parts:
I’ve stopped going to professional tastings. I cannot stand it anymore. For me, whether sit-down or stand-up, vertical, horizontal or abdominal, those pucker-faced tastings - like a Miss World contest - strip all of the pleasure and beauty - and most of the meaning - from wine. A single bottle of wine, even of the most marginal value, you need to get to know it, like you need to get to know a bloody person. You need to spend at least an hour with it. You need to see it evolve from the time you open it, from the time that it itself opens, to how your palate changes, to how the atmosphere changes. How can you possibly have a sense of what the wine is in front of you by tasting 50 wines (if not more) in the space of an hour, spending at most only a minute or two in front of each, as many critics do? This is madness to me. Madness. And it has become the predominant method for wine critics all over the world. And then imagine that after that most superficial of contacts with a wine, a mathematical value is attributed to the wine’s value and quality! Lewis Carroll is alive and well.