Natural Resistance (2014)

Ten years after the landmark wine documentary Mondovino, filmmaker Jonathan Nossiter returns to the subject, documenting the drastic shifts that have affected the industry in the time since... See full summary »

Director:

Jonathan Nossiter

Stars:

Stefano Bellotti, Elena Pantaleoni, Giovanna Tiezzi

Cast

Cast overview:
Stefano Bellotti	...	Himself
Elena Pantaleoni	...	Herself
Giovanna Tiezzi	...	Herself
Corrado Dottori	...	Himself
Gianluca Farinelli	...	Himself

Storyline

Ten years after the landmark wine documentary Mondovino, filmmaker Jonathan Nossiter returns to the subject, documenting the drastic shifts that have affected the industry in the time since. This time, the threat is no longer globalization, but an individual society. Natural Resistance follows four Italian winegrowers who live the life we all dream of: Giovanna Tiezzi lives in a converted 11th century monastery, and grow grains, fruit, and wine in a way that links to their ancient heritage. Corrado Dottori is a refugee from industrial Milan, who inherited his grandfather's farmstead and tends to it as an expression of agricultural social justice. Elena Pantaleoni works her father's vineyards and strives to create a utopian reality. Finally Stefano Belloti, the controversial radical farmer poet, disrupts the long established rules of farming from his avant-garde property in the Piedmont. Each of these farmers have encountered a fierce resistance as they struggle to make their dreams of...

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Plot Keywords:

vineyard | 

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Genres:

Documentary

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Certificate:

Not Rated

Details

Country:

Italy France

Language:

Italian

Release Date:

29 May 2014 (Italy)

Also Known As:

Resistenza Naturale

Filming Locations:

Tuscany, Italy

Company Credits

Production Co:

Goatworks Films, Les Films du Rat, Cineteca del Comune di Bologna

Technical Specs

Runtime:

85 min

Sound Mix:

Dolby Digital

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.85 : 1

User Reviews

Incomplete and without real direction

I saw this at a press screening and have a lengthier article about it in my column, but in brief, it doesn't match with Nossiter's previous Mondovino which took him five years to make. It feels like he sat down with a few Italian wine producers and chatted about the current state of wine over a couple of days--which is what he admitted to in the Q&A after wards. That's fine, but making an 83 minute film about it with oddly interspersed movie clips doesn't really make for enjoyable watching. It's really the last 10 minutes of the film that contain any meat and honestly, it should have started with that and delved in to what's happening to winemaking in the EU and those winemakers who are standing up to it, not just in Italy, but in Spain and France as well, the latter of which has the strongest natural wine movement in all of Europe.