Sideways
A while back, when Sideways first played in the theatres, a friend of mine mentioned his surprise at the success of a movie that cast middle-aged men in a “teen-sex-romp comedy.” An observation that few can fail to agree with, and which is the result of the film’s seamless mixing of low comedy and drama.
The film focuses on the exploits of Miles (Paul Giamatti) and Jack (Thomas Haden Church), old college buddies who are spending a week in the Santa Ynez Valley, ostensibly celebrating the coming of Jack’s marriage. Miles is ineffectually suffering through the throws of a divorce and Jack is trying to get as much action as possible before his marriage. The movie’s title is appropriate as they evade their responsibilities, ever slipping sideways, pulling each other into a whirlpool that swirls like the wine in their glasses, until they end up “floating,” as Haden Church puts it in the DVD commentary, “like two manatees in formaldehyde.”
Like a teen movie, their adventure really begins when they sneak out of the house of Miles’s mother, from whom Miles stole money earlier. This highlights their inadequacy to support themselves as healthy adults, emotionally, even monetarily. They drive up north and the screen begins to cut into boxes, a technique popular in the seventies, which frames them in their decade of adolescence. It’s hard as a viewer not to participate in Jack’s youthful, Dionysian joie de vivre, particularly when he comes running out of the vineyard with cases of wine, ready to “party,” as he so often puts it.
The teenage pranks continue as they steal a full pour from a wine counter as the server walks away. Yet, Miles cannot invariably forestall the heavy blow brought about by his past actions, which becomes weightier with age and experience.
It’s when Miles finds out about his ex-wife’s recent marriage that the childish bickering gains staggering weight. In a Chaplinesque sequence, Miles, in a refusal to accept the blow, evades Jack and with his teeth uncorks a bottle of wine, which he ensues to pull heavily on as he clumsily runs down a step hill to get away from Jack. The music starts up and the camera pulls out, an old technique of the silent comedies. The slapstick comedy deftly shifts to drama when Miles stops to catch his breath and a cluster of grapes seizes his attention. The film slows and becomes delicate. The light plays over the dusty grapes, enriching them and highlighting their duality. The fruit is affirmation, the alcohol denial. Does Miles indulge in wine to engage life or escape it? We all know it’s the latter.
Indeed, wine becomes a vehicle through which Maya (Virginia Madsen) reaches out to Miles. It is life to her and she pushes him towards accepting his. A 61’ will peak so it must be enjoyed before its decline, and a wine is overdone when it has “too much alcohol. It overwhelms the fruit.”
It’s these deeper themes that enrich the movie, the subtleties too, particularly when Miles purchases a “Barely Legal,” and asks for the most recent one. From this we know it isn’t a random purchase, and we get a stronger characterization.
As can be seen, the movie is an amalgam of drama and comedy, old technique and new—its mixture as complex as the Cheval Blanc Miles finally drinks near the end, which is a blend of Cabernet Franc and, get this, Merlot. Hence, the film speaks of acceptance, the crossing of boundaries and the breakdown of order too.
My thesaurus has two entries for middle-aged: 1. mid-life, balding, frumpy. 2. complacent, satisfied, settled. Miles fits the first to a tee, but doesn’t come anywhere near the second. His incongruity shatters the popular definition, says something about age, that even as we grow older, more perceptive, subtle, and perhaps patient, we never really lose that child in us, who manifests himself in our buffoonery, confusion, and impatience. Furthermore, these cliché definitions are destabilized, as age seems a weak determinant, and the abilities to adapt to life and find pleasure in the simplest things come to define maturity rather than childhood.
In the DVD’s behind the scenes featurette, Alexander Payne expresses his hope that the “beautiful, harmonious, [and] pleasant experience of making the film is communicated to the viewer,” and it truly is in the extra features. Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church goof around like old chums on the film’s commentary. The main players reminisce on the time they spent on the set. A parting montage is also provided at the end, which captures the nostalgia of flipping through a box of old photos. Fans will be pleased to revisit the film. I give it an A.
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