Mondovino: The Series
December 2–10, 2006
Tracing winemaking’s past and present, Mondovino: The Series employs an elastic and unconventional form of movie storytelling related more to the serial publication of a nineteenth-century novel than to the traditional compact narratives of cinema. Responding to the challenge of organizing five hundred hours of rushes shot over several years in seven countries and five different languages, and with competing cultures vying for attention, Jonathan Nossiter’s ten-hour edit—created simultaneously with his Cannes-competition feature edit, Mondovino (2005)—is a bedazzling tapestry of ten autonomous stories, each with its own complete narrative cycle. Taken together, the episodes create one vast narrative with its own distinctive arc. The aesthetic reflects the fluidity and restless shooting style that Nossiter explored during filming, but more important, it answers the challenge of material that cries out for new forms to match new digital technologies and shifting audience expectations. The spontaneity of digital filmmaking gave the director more freedom to explore the complexity of his subject matter and a greater intimacy with his enormous cast of characters.
Mondovino: The Series. 2006. France. Ten films produced and directed by Jonathan Nossiter. In French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian; English subtitles. 600 min. Theatrical world premiere.
Organized by Jytte Jensen, Curator, Department of Film.
Mondovino: The Series, Episodes 1 and 2
Mondovino: The Series. 2006. France. Ten films produced and directed by Jonathan Nossiter. In French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian; English subtitles.
Episode #1: Where’s Astérix?/Little Town, Big Hell
The cast of characters in southern France: a Socialist mayor defending the American multinational company Mondavi; a Communist Mayor defending conservative French (wine) values; Aimé Guibert, father of the Languedoc wine revolution; the Vaillé brothers, Guibert’s nouveau riche neighbors and competitors; and…Gérard Depardieu.
Episode #2: Magic Potion
Moving north to the hallowed region of Burgundy to explore the sacred French notion of terroir (sense of place), we meet the loving but profoundly fractured Montille family. Program 120 min.
Saturday, December 2, 2:00; Wednesday, December 6, 8:15. T2
Mondovino: The Series, Episodes 3 and 4
Mondovino: The Series. 2006. France. Ten films produced and directed by Jonathan Nossiter. In French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian; English subtitles.
Episode #3: Rome Was Not Built in a Day
Napa rules the American wine industry, but who’s behind the scenes? This black comedy shows that the Mexican workers have a greater voice than the “chiefs” in their Beverly Hills–style mansions think.
Episode #4: Pax Panoramix
The battle to defend nature and local artisanal winemaking extends from the Pyrénnés mountains (Yvonne Hégoburu fights to create organic wine in her late husband’s memory) to the asphalt of Brooklyn (quintessential New Yorker Neal Rosenthal) to Burgundy (the unlikely rebel Aubert de Villaine of Romanée Conti, the guardian of the wine world’s most sacred and aristocratic treasure) to Bordeaux (Pierre Siri, “The Mouse that Roared”). Program 120 min.
Saturday, December 2, 4:30; Thursday, December 7, 8:00. T2
Mondovino: The Series, Episodes 5 and 6
Mondovino: The Series. 2006. France. Ten films produced and directed by Jonathan Nossiter. In French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian; English subtitles.
Episode #5: The Appian Way
An intimate, revealing portrait of Robert Parker, whose reviews dictate the fate of much of the wine world, from California to London to Chile.
Episode #6: Quo Vademus
If wine is unique as a mirror of human complexity, and the only product capable of improving over seventy to eighty years, then how is “enduring youth” achieved? California and Paris compete over the fountain of youth. Program 120 min.
Saturday, December 2, 7:00; Friday, December 8, 6:00. T2
Mondovino: The Series, Episodes 7 and 8
Mondovino: The Series. 2006. France. Ten films produced and directed by Jonathan Nossiter. In French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian; English subtitles.
Episode #7: All Roads Lead to Rome
How would a grape respond under psychoanalysis? Jean-Louis Laplanche, world-renowned psychiatrist and Freud translator, is the owner of the Chateau de Pommard in Burgundy. Yet his peculiarity does not compare with that of the husband-and-wife psychiatric team who bought and sold the Napa winery aptly named “Folie à deux.”
Episode #8: When in Rome…
The Antinori and Frescobaldi families have dominated the political and economic life of Tuscany for a thousand years. For the past thirty, they’ve concentrated all their resources in wine. The tensions and conflicts underlying the two ruling families resemble a nineteenth-century opera (or a Mafia turf war). Program 120 min.
Sunday, December 3, 2:30; Saturday, December 9, 6:15. T2
Mondovino: The Series, Episodes 9 and 10
Mondovino: The Series. 2006. France. Ten films produced and directed by Jonathan Nossiter. In French, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Italian; English subtitles.
Episode #9: Et tu Brute...
The Tuscan saga continues: betrayal, redemption, and globalization—Italian-style. The two families fight it out for the hand of America’s Mondavi family. But who’s the real winner and who’s the real loser? And what does it mean for U.S.-European relations when the dust finally settles?
Episode #10: Veni, vidi, vendidi (I Came, I Saw, I Sold)
Brazil, Paraguay, Argentina: the New Wine World, but with age-old conflicts. What’s at stake for indigenous people and foreign investors? How do the European-American conflicts play out in South America? Program 120 min.
Sunday, December 3, 5:00; Sunday, December 10, 5:00. T2
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