Blood Into Wine

Blood Into Wine is a documentary film recently released about how rockstar Maynard James Keenan of Tool decided to move to Arizona and start a vineyard and making wine. It is an independent film with very limited release. I attended last Thursday the first of the only two showings in Portland, OR at Cinema 21.

Cinema 21 had a rough start for the night. They opened the doors at 8:25 when they said the showing began at 8:30. We waited until 9:00 for it to begin, and the crowd was getting anxious when Eric Glomski, Keenan’s business partner, appeared in front of us and introduced the film. That helped the mood of the theater, but when they started the film, the sound was turned off, causing the crowd to call for a restart of the film. Oye, rough start.

The film is more like something the Arizona Wine Commission, if there is one, would put out, advertising that Arizona can make wine and using a celebrity to draw attention to it. But it was an entertaining film, as they did try to use humor to keep the documentary entertaining, though sometimes they tried too hard.

The film also dealt with the double life of Keenan. Keenan is a rockstar, and a lot of people in the theater were there to see him and could care less about the wine. Yet, that is a good thing, as those people would be exposed to wine when they normally wouldn’t.

At the end of the film, Glomski did a question and answer session for a good amount of time while we sampled some of the wine in the film. One man admitted that he didn’t like wine and was there to see Keenan, but he liked their wine being served.

I don’t know if Glomski said it in the film or afterwards, but the biggest message I got from it for my own personal use is that it is good if he can get you to buy one bottle of his wine, but it is better if he can get you to buy a second bottle. This idea is that people are willing to experiment and try things, but you know you have a good product if they want to buy it again after having one.

All in all, I think I wouldn’t mind owning the film when it comes out on DVD in May. I would watch it again with a notepad to jot down things about the wine industry business and see how I could apply it to my own dreams of opening a cider house.