Review - Alexander Payne's Sideways (3 out of 4 stars)

I must be on some find of buddy film trip. At least this one isn’t as twisted as the last two. Sideways, winner of the several awards and nominated for the Oscar, is a buddy road trip film. Miles is a schoolteacher who has aspirations to be a published writer. He’s also two years into a depression stemming from his divorce. Miles has a manuscript submitted for the consideration of a publisher. Jack is Miles’s best friend, and he’s to be married in a week. Jack used to be an actor in television series, but now he’s just doing commercial work. He’s chosen Miles, his roommate from college days, to be his best man. Miles takes Jack on a “bachelor road trip” through California’s Wine Valley for the week before the wedding.



Miles is a wine geek. He’s not a connoisseur, he’s a geek. He talks about wine like tech geeks talk about gadgets, sports stat geeks talk about their fantasy leagues and comic book geeks talk about super heroes. He adores pinot noir, despises merlot, and has been getting drunk on wine since his divorce. Jack appears to be an average Joe looking for a good time before he gives up his bachelor freedom.

Sideways, like my recent subjects Training Day and Collateral, has a lot of interaction going on in the car as Jack and Miles talk on the long drives. They feel very real. Thomas Hayden Church plays the level headed, everyday man Jack well. It’s easy to find something in Jack that’s in all of us. However, the star of the show is Paul Giamatti, who’s received rave reviews for his portrayal of Miles. In a life that’s going nowhere fast, Miles drowns himself in his love of wine, and everything can be traced back to the grape on the vine. Geeks will find a sense of kinship with Miles, as he struggles to get his life on track while trying to rationalize why his life is so shitty.

Virginia Madsen and Sandra Oh are the love interests of Miles and Jack, Maya and Stephanie. Maya is another divorced wine geek, which you’d think is the perfect setup for Miles. However, Miles is a geek in a two-year long depression, so that predictably affects his approach towards the whole thing. Steph is the girl that makes Jack, like so many men, question whether he’s ready to tie himself down to one woman.

Truth to tell, I expected a lot from Sideways due to the accolades that the film was receiving. I was mildly disappointed. Alexander Payne does a good if safe directing job, and there aren’t any surprises. The film comes across as sincere and intimate and real. The shots range from pretty to gorgeous. The script leans a lot on wine jargon, and it’s easy to get immersed in the Miles’s passion for the stuff. (Reports have a 16% increase in the sales of pinot noir in the aftermath of Sideways. Merlot grew by a modest 3%.) Still, Sideways didn’t appeal to me as much as Lost in Translation and Before Sunrise/Sunset. I liked the interaction of Miles and Maya, but it didn’t have the spontaneity or spark of the aforementioned films. Still, Sideways is a very good film, and well worth the viewing. However, I don’t think that it’s Best Picture material.

Bottom line: Fine film, take time to catch it