by Al Drinkle
One of the best ways to get to know a wine is to drink it in a movie theatre. Escaping into cinematic fantasy allows us to approach wine more openly, and the dark, expansive environment helps to sow the seeds of acute flavour memories. Sipping at the picture show is an opportunity for unexpected intimacy between the drinker and their drink.
We're all quite alone in a movie theatre, regardless of how packed it might be or how many friends have accompanied us. The lights go down, the screen stirs with dazzling images, and everyone (and everything!) else seems to disappear. Your phone is turned off, nobody's going to walk in to ask you when you’re going to make dinner, and any distracting whims of appetite or bodily functions were attended to prior to the opening credits. Your ego is partially superseded by the world that the director has created, and in a way, you yourself disappear along with everyone else. Your existence is reduced to that of the consummate observer, and if there's a glass of wine in your hand, its aromas and flavours have an unusual potential to stupefy and enthrall.
The darkness of the theatre is a factor too, and not only so one can inconspicuously imbibe unauthorized beverages. Darkness is the playground of the imagination, and while our eyes and ears are tantalized by the director's vision, our noses and mouths are exceedingly susceptible to the details of the wine. But just as the filmgoing experience won't make an absolute turkey seem like an Oscar candidate, drinking a poorly- or industrially-made wine in a movie theatre isn't going to enhance its allure. When smuggling wine into the movies, be sure to select one that's appealing and authentic, and be prepared to taste its delicious stories told with unprecedented articulation and vividity.
My most recent cinematic wine experience was exceptional. I attended a screening of Ida Lupino's The Hitch-Hiker with a sneaky bottle of 2021 Rheinhessen Riesling Kabinett from Weingut Schätzel. Perhaps 1953 was only a middling year for film noir, but 2021 was a brilliant vintage for Kabinett Riesling, and Schätzel's wine in question is an exhilarating example. It offers a barely-registrable 7% alcohol, an almost excruciating level of acidity, and an elusive whisper of sweetness that lingers just long enough to knit all of the other components together before flitting off into a hoar-frost-laden woodland. It shimmers like an angelic hologram and tastes like a sweet-and-sour spiderweb, growing in spectral detail with each successive sip. I wove it to its fullest as William Talman terrorized the highways on the screen.
Alas, movies always end, and life begins again. For some, certain anxieties arise as the silver screen ceases to glow; for others it’s a brand of loneliness that's impervious to human company. As for me, I left the theatre and walked down 8th Avenue distracted by a familiar but confounding mystery—namely, how in the world can mere fermented grape juice be so emotive and inspiring?!?
