San Francisco Mondovino Premier

When I started this blog, I had in mind that it would be a place for me to shape the vague ideas bouncing around in my head. However, while I am working on some higher concept posts, I'd like there to be more content in the meantime. In that vein, here is a (slightly edited) email I sent to a friend about the San Francisco premier of the wine world documentary Mondovino:

The event was in a screening room of a new condo development south of
Market close to the Embarcadero. The setting, at least, was fairly
generic, although, since small, fairly intimate. Most of the crowd
was dressed nicely but not especially upscale, and everyone was pretty
relaxed. Nossiter, I think, was dressed in a corduroy sport coat and
casual slacks or even jeans. He recommended that people would
probably be more comfortable not sitting in the first few rows. I
knew one person there: Joe Bilman who runs Subterraneum wine storage
where I rent a locker, and who had sent out the email announcement
that I had forwarded to you. I also recognized Steve Edmunds of
Edmunds-St.John, someone who, though mild-mannered, is obviously very
passionate about individually crafted wines.

For the Q&A period, there were about 6 people on stage. I recall only
Randall Graham of Bonny Doon, Jonathan Nossiter, Joel Rosenthal, an
inporter featured in the film, and Garen Staglin of Staglin Family
Vineyards. There were a couple other people involved in other aspects
of the wine business, a trader and perhaps a writer. Randy Graham:
definitely a terroirist but not willing to condemn micro-oxidation
completely, "if used judiciously"; mostly seemed silent and
thoughtful. Joel Rosenthal was much the way he came across in the
film. Jonathan Nossiter was criticized for filming people in ways
that rather slighted them, with the odd camera angles or showing that
guy's balls, or protraying the Frescobaldis as particularly venal, or
for showing Bob Parker's dog's ass, or for showing Michel Rolland just
hopping out of limos and recommending to everyone to use
micro-oxidation, or for just showing the Staglin family hanging out
around the house all day instead of being in the vineyards. His
almost uniform defense was that he just showed what people chose to
show him - he would have gladly filmed Staglin or Rolland in the vineyards if that were where they had taken him, for example. Garen
Staglin said that he very much resented how his wife's comments -
about getting their workers a t-shirt - were taken out of context and
implied that they were not caring and involved in their workers'
lives. He said that when Michel Rolland comes to his winery to
consult, he stays the whole day, and that in the five years he has
known Rolland, he has never heard him say micro-oxigenate. Everyone I
talked to said that they admired Staglin's courage for getting up on
the stage after that movie. A couple audience criticised the film as
unnecessarily divisive, greatly exaggerating what controversy existed.
One of them, a Burgundy buyer for a local wine store, came up to Nossiter at the
reception afterwards and said he found Nossiter's defense against
being divisive - that he just showed what he saw - so facile as to be
disingenious.

In the film Rosenthal commented that the current battle in the wine world was like the collaborators and the resistance in World War II. One of the panelists, perhaps Nossiter, said that a historian of the period had told him that, at the time, it was difficult to tell what exactly constituted collaboration or what constituted resistance, and therefore, who exactly was collaborating or resisting. This was agreed to apply to the current "battle" over wine.

There were three Joel Rosenthal selection wines served at the
reception - a Bandol Rose, a white Burgundy, and a St. Emillion. All
were fabulous, to my taste. The Bandol was light, richly but
delicately floral, and still gently girded by something approaching
structure. The Burgundy had a good core of concentrated ripe (but not
super-ripe) fruit, and a good supporting acidity not really distinct
from the fruit. The Bordeaux was concentrated red fruit, cedar spicy
and black earth, very lively and hitting many notes at once. I wanted
to ask him more about the wines, but I never managed to get in a word
between the other people there talking to him. (In that crowd, I was "just a consumer".)

Joe Bilman's comment was that, in his opinion, the movie was summed up
by his own choice in cars: a 1973 Alfa Romeo and a 2004 Lexus. Each
has its charms.