“We finally asked him if he minded if we use that line and, in a wonderful twist of events, he surprised us and said; ‘Sure, I completely agree with the critique.’”
The filmmakers ended up shooting at a number of local wineries including Foxen, Kalyra, Fess Parker and Sanford. Bottles featured include Sea Smoke, Fiddlehead Cellars and The Hitching Post’s private wine label, Highliner.
Of course, there can be a dark side to steady wine consumption, which Miles becomes all too familiar with in SIDEWAYS – in one heartbreakingly comic sequence he is so in need of a drink, he chugs from a tasting room’s spit bucket. But, in the end it is wine that brings him closer to Maya, and it is his trip with Jack to the wine country that brings him, in some ways, closer to an understanding of his “plight.”
“When Miles tells Maya why he likes Pinot so much, of course he’s describing himself on some level,” says Payne. “On the other hand, he knows Jack is more of a Cabernet, which can be grown anywhere and survive even when neglected. But, however you look at it, wine is a big part of human experience.”
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