Pairing wine with movies! See the trailers and hear the fascinating commentary for these movies, and many more, at Trailers From Hell. This week, Let's get crazy. Let's get nuts. Let's pair wine with some films from the fringe.
From the crazy '60s, 1969 actually, Coming Apart stars Rip Torn as a psychiatrist with mental problems. Physician, heal thyself. Good luck, with that hidden camera in your spare apartment.
Released with a rating of X due to the explicit sex scenes, one critic called it pornography for intellectuals, which is what I thought Playboy magazine was when I was a teenager. Oh, I only bought it for the cartoons.
Baccio Divino has the perfect wine for this theme. The label is perfect, at least. The strange Italian red blend is called Pazzo, which means "crazy." So, call me crazy, but I think mixing Dolcetto with Cabernet Sauvignon, Petite Sirah, Merlot, and Petit Verdot is brilliant.
Clint Eastwood's Play Misty for Me holds a special place in my heart. Clint plays a cool radio deejay in Carmel. I, too, was a deejay, and figured if I was good enough at it, I would someday drive a sports car on Highway 1 and do my show on tape so I could come and go as I pleased. The downside: women with knives.
I never got the sports car on Highway 1 and I spent many long hours chained to a microphone. On the other hand, I never got stabbed.
Eastwood was once the mayor of Carmel, so a Monterey wine would be appropriate. He told interviewers that he preferred to drink Chardonnay, so let’s grab one from Bernardus, which has several good Chards in the 30 to 50 dollar range.
The 1976 slasher pic Alice, Sweet Alice was directed by Alfred Sole, a guy whose previous film got him charged with obscenity and excommunicated in the state of New Jersey. Who knew Jersians could get so upset over a movie? Eddie and the Cruisers 2, anyone?
Brooke Shields debuts here and glides into a career in film'n'fashion, where the wine, bubbles and sometimes tequila flow like a fire hydrant. Brooke now says she has a glass of water for every drink. I knew a guy who claimed to "run a mile for every one of these," as he held up a Rob Roy. I always imagined him running a marathon before work each day.
Alice, Sweet Alice had several different titles, one of which was Communion. Is Alice, Sweet Alice an indictment of the church, child abuse, the death of the family, or psychiatry? Have fun guessing, while I focus on the wine.
Fat Bastard's Bloody Red is a French Grenache/Merlot/Syrah blend that's perfect for a slasher movie. Really marketed for Halloween, it works here as well. It only costs about $10.