For several years my daily commute sauntered along a well-worn country road past berry stands, horse pastures, vineyards, and a lavender farm, into a village built around a 19th century stagecoach stop and a flagpole that flies half-mast when one of the 1000 town residents dies. Beyond a short row of olive trees and just before the saddlery, I would turn left into an alley, where next to a restaurant patio with a blooming arbor and a kaleidoscope of flower boxes, a man once stated unequivocally that he would leave if anyone ordered any fucking Merlot. 

The unsuspecting village is Los Olivos, the country road slices through the valley called Santa Ynez, and the context, of course, is the Oscar-winning wine movie Sideways, which celebrates its 20th anniversary this month. It had been a slow burn for Paul Giamatti’s character Miles up to that moment, who has the hangdog, bloodshot temperament of someone who has seen his distorted reflection in an empty wine bottle a few too many times, a man seemingly resigned to his fate as a divorced, middle-aged, burnt-out novelist with bad friends. But the casual mention of a soft red wine ignites the pent-up ragefires within, leading to the first, and likely only, Merlot meltdown in history. 

Jack: “If they want to drink Merlot, we’re drinking Merlot.” 
Miles: “No. If anyone orders Merlot, I’m leaving. I am not drinking any fucking Merlot!” 

When that line first struck in October 2004, I was sitting with a hundred others in a movie theater in southern California, and it was such a jolt that we took a silent intake for a beat, before exploding into laughter that would roll in aftershocks for the next 30 seconds. I doubt we even knew yet why we were laughing; it hit like a gut punch of absurdity: who could possibly go apoplectic over something as innocuous as Merlot? The delivery crashed with such finality that it seemed not only would Miles bolt if any member of their party ordered Merlot; he might leave if anyone anywhere ordered Merlot. 

It’s a seemingly throwaway line, the only reference to Merlot in the film. But while Sideways is a love letter to Pinot Noir, the Merlot line is the only one people remember. The impact on the wine industry was swift. 

The Los Olivos Wine Merchant & Cafe, backdrop to these shenanigans, featured a Merlot by the glass at the time the movie was released. But soon afterwards, it was laughed off the menu. Nationally, while Pinot sales soared 16 percent in 2005, Merlot sales dropped 2 percent‚ and more significantly, plantings in California over the next decade decreased more than 30 percent. “Mr. Merlot,” Christian Moueix, who sold over a million cases of his eponymous Right Bank Merlot in the 1990s, lost 30 percent in sales in 2004, which led him to call Sideways “that nasty movie.” 

Others have argued that while the Sideways curse on the reputation of Merlot was real, its actual direct impact on the industry was negligible. They say that Merlot was already in decline in California, as it had been overplanted, overcropped, and overproduced in order to meet the demand of wine drinkers who craved Cabernet Lite. They argue that the vast majority of domestic Merlots at the time were simple, fruity-but-sometimes-vegetal pizza wines, and if Sideways had any direct impact, it was to put those Merlots out of their misery. 

Yet once the vineyard dust on those debates settles, all the wine geeks remind us (with the sparkle of a magician’s turn) that Miles didn’t actually hate Merlot. For his treasured bottle, stored up in his closet at home waiting for the elusive perfect occasion, is a 1961 Château Cheval Blanc. It is one of the best wines ever made: a blend of 60 percent Cabernet Franc and 40 percent fucking Merlot. 

That is why I always wondered if there was more to Miles’ Merlot meltdown. Yes, you could argue he detests cheap, domestic Merlot, but long-aged Right Bank Bordeaux blends are another category altogether. Which is true. But I wasn’t convinced this was the whole story. 

Ten years later, I overheard another interpretation. This was during the 10th anniversary of Sideways, when I found myself on a ranch in Los Alamos at an epic industry party hosted by Jim Clendenen, the lionized and much-missed founder of Au Bon Climat. Paul Giamatti and director Alexander Payne were there, along with a who’s who of Santa Barbara wine legends, and somehow, me, just three days into my job at Au Bon Climat. Everyone was a few glasses of Pinot deep, though one prankster thought it would be funny to bring a jeroboam of Merlot. The crossfire was spirited, as some argued for the merits of Merlot, planted in the right places, but someone else in my earshot whispered a rumor: Miles didn’t attack Merlot because he thought it was an inferior wine. He hated it because that is what he and his ex-wife used to enjoy together. 

Here was a take on a person’s individual tastes in wine that cut deep. It shed light on Miles’ post-traumatic reaction to the mere mention of Merlot. And it made sense of the Cheval Blanc in his closet, which he had reserved for their 10th wedding anniversary that never happened. 

Yet I wasn’t persuaded that 40 percent Merlot in one bottle was sufficient evidence to support that Miles and his ex-wife Victoria drank Merlot together. Neither the movie nor the book it was adapted from makes any mention of them drinking Duckhorn by candlelight. But I thought the personal angle was insightful, because as the film goes on, the more the audience realizes that when the characters talk about wine, they are talking about themselves. 

There is Miles’ soliloquy on the fragile beauty of Pinot Noir, which requires just the right conditions to thrive, and without them, is mere untapped potential. (He sounds like every writer with an unpublished manuscript.)

And then there is Maya’s sizzling speech about the cycle in the bottle: “I like to think about the life of wine, how it's a living thing . . . I like how wine continues to evolve, like if I opened a bottle of wine today, it would taste different than if I opened it on any other day. Because a bottle of wine is actually alive—and it's constantly evolving and gaining complexity. That is, until it peaks—like your '61—and then it begins its steady, inevitable decline.” 

While Maya is speaking of herself, and of everyone at middle-age, she also draws Miles in with the mention of his ‘61. She doesn’t even name the bottle, just the vintage. That ‘61 is middle-aged, right about the same age as Miles—and intriguingly, harvested the same year that Sideways director and screenwriter Alexander Payne was born. It’s not only Merlot but also Cabernet Franc. 

Now recall the one line about Cab Franc in the movie: 

Miles: “I’ve come never to expect greatness from Cab Franc.” 

I think the '61 in his closet represents Miles himself and the old life to which he has been clinging. Thus his rage toward Merlot and his low expectations of Cab Franc are tied up with his own self-loathing. This is a bottle that should be on display in a glamorous cellar, or the crown of a five-star wine list, but instead it lies sideways in a shag-carpeted closet in a low-rent district, pining for a special occasion that will never come. It’s a symbol of his life’s unfulfilled promises, his shattered expectations about how all of this was supposed to go. “So, you see, I’m not really not much of a writer,” he tells Maya over voicemail near the end of the movie. “I am not much of anything.” 

For years I thought it was tragic that his '61 Cheval Blanc is finally gulped unceremoniously out of a Styrofoam cup, stashed in a vinyl booth in a burger joint. Now I see it as cathartic. Just before this scene, after learning that his ex-wife is not only remarried but pregnant, Miles turns left out of the church parking lot when everyone else turns right, and the audience is left to wonder whether Miles is about to end his life. In a way, he does. His old life dies in that Styrofoam cup, his unresolved grief now poured out. 

Perhaps, finally, there is hope for Miles to move forward, rather than only sideways.