Movie Reviews
In “Sideways”, Jack is conducting a road trip with his best buddy, Miles. Jack is on board because he’s getting married at the end of the week. He wants to “party” before his “freedom” is taken away. Miles is along for the ride to drive mostly, and to stop by every vineyard and winery he can find.
Miles is a wine connoisseur, and by the time they’ve driven thirty miles, you’ll become more than aware that wine has begun to take total control. He obsessed with it. He can’t stand being away from it for longs periods of time. He is passionate about nothing else. In fact, when in the presence of wine, he almost always gets drunk without meaning to.
Jack, on the other hand, has a set plan to get drunk. The wine is there for his debauchery. He uses it to get women. Yes, get women. That’s his other reason for being on the trip. To cheat on his fiancé before she does it to him, although he never says it like that.
While “Sideways” is very much so a comedy, it’s also a human drama; the story of how four people’s lives collide, and how life keeps going whether they are ready for it or not. Director Alexander Payne (who co-scripted this with Jim Taylor) knows precisely how to set up his characters into awkward situations. He’s not cruel to his characters by throwing them in, he gives them the signs they should be reading. That way, we know the characters are the ones with the flaws, not the movie itself. It is in its structure that Payne is able to brilliantly mix comedy and drama, and make this a movie about human revelation.
The cast is one of the most well thought out ensembles of the year. Not one line is skewed, not one emotion is misinterpreted, and not one actor brings the others down. It’s something disappointingly rare to have a group of actors like this make each other better.
Thomas Haden Church, Virginia Madsen, and Sandra Oh are flawless, yes, but Paul Giamatti gives a performance of pure beauty and heart. This is an actor who, up until “American Splendor”, was making movies like “Big Fat Liar”. He has come a long way from there, and I can’t wait to see him mature even more as an artist. *** ˝