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I am always on the lookout for beer video/films/documentaries and I think I found a good one in Pints. Just the fact that they start with episode 1 being about Terminal Gravity Brewing is great. This will hopefully make for a good learning experience.
Sometimes the L.A. Times movie sneak preview can be too daunting. Title after title for the next three months. But on a recent Sunday, I took my sweet time and ran across this….
So keep an eye out for a possible craft beer documentary. Why do I say “possible”, because I could find no other info on it. I could find barely any info even on IMDB which usually has at least a Facebook page.
A new documentary that touches the Chicago beer scene will be hitting the movie festival circuit. Entitled “F*** Your Hair,” the movie from Jason Polevoi aims the camera lens at the Latino-owned craft brewery 5 Rabbit Cerveceria and their bold decision to stop making a house beer for a Donald Trump-owned hotel in Chicago.
The owners of 5 Rabbit, Andres Araya and Mila Ramirez are themselves immigrants and chose to make a stand against the racist and quite frankly un-American current immigration policy as embodied in our delusion in orange hair chief.
There might even be screenings at breweries across the country. But for now, a trailer….
Looks like a craft beer documentary opened recently for a brief and probably very limited “in theater” run before hitting the digital realm next month this time.
The movie is Brewmaster from filmmaker Douglas Tirola. The documentary is about one person, in this case a lawyer, trying to break into brewing and another going for the Master Cicerone level of beer knowledge.
There are interviews with the usual roster: Garrett Oliver, Jim Koch, Sam Calagione and deeper cuts like Vaclav Berka from Pilsner Urquell, beer writer Randy Mosher and Cicerone Founder Ray Daniels.
When I first started blogging about beer, I heard about a documentary in the works about it helmed by Jay Sheveck. News would pop up here and there but then it seemed the project had died on the bine, as it were.
But then Facebook brought this to my timeline:
I checked the website and it appears that sometime mid next year, Beer Pioneers might actually be released. (Whether streaming or DVD or subscription remains to be seen)
I do like the New Albion meets Oregon Trail game look of the poster and the roster of beer names is impressive so let’s hope I can review it sometime next year.
Mikkeller DTLA recently posted about a new documentary in the works from a pair of their employees and it is something that I wanted to put on the radar of beer fans because even a short film would probably contain enough info to really raise the consciousness. I will update when more information becomes available.
One of the benefits of having streaming services so hungry for content is that you can see documentaries that cover the spectrum of topics. Competitive baristas or a quick history of, say, Bourbon.
Neat – A History of Bourbon is beautifully shot. Stuffed to almost the breaking point with images of Bourbon being splashed into glasses. The film covers major points in Bourbon history such as the Bonded Act and Congress enshrining the drink as only Made in America followed by the creation of single barrel and small batch bourbons. Summarized a bit too much but still clearly expressed.
But the true heart of the story are two people who needed much more screen time, Freddie Johnson and Marianne Barnes. Johnson who is a third generation employee as a tour guide tour guide for Buffalo Trace speaks very eloquently especially about his father and relationships. Very touching stuff. Barnes is the master distiller for a new (as of filming) distillery, Castle & Key—a new Kentucky distillery. She is the first female master distiller in Kentucky since Prohibition and I would love to have heard more about her journey in Bourbon.
Beware, you will want some Bourbon on hand and you may want to make an Old Fashioned at the end.
As I was scrolling through Netflix I came across a British documentary/news program about alcohol. The Truth About Alcohol was part education, part government propaganda and part reality TV.
There was some good nuggets of information throughout the sixty minute running time but I couldn’t shake the theory that this was a commercial for the health service that was basically saying that 14 units (2 units equal a pint of beer) was ALL you could safely drink in one week. Oh, the host would say that he drank and that you could drink more if you really wanted too but….
What also undercut the message was the fact that all beer was treated the same. A pint is two units. Doesn’t matter if it is a low alcohol bitter from the pub or an American barrel-aged Imperial Stout over 10% ABV. There was no problem talking about red vs white wine but the lack of beer diversity (for lack of better phrase) was a bit demeaning.
So, watch, but watch with a careful eye.
I had the pleasure of seeing the new documentary Nuts! recently which is the story behind a doctor in the 1920’s and 1930’s who made use of goats, big radio towers and impotent males to create an empire in both Kansas and Texas.
And in talking with the narrator of the picture, Gene Tognacci, I learned that there was a maibock from Free State Brewing named after the subject of the documentary. Now there are more and more TV and movie tie-in beers out there from Vacation to Game of Thrones and one I will be posting about later today but this is the first instance of a beer that was brewed first but ties in perfectly with a documentary.
I encourage you to see the movie and then go home and pop open a bock bier if you liked it. And maybe we can get more documentary beers out there. Perhaps an untapped market.
There are probably quite a few documentaries that could be made about the past, present and future of craft beer in Portland. And I certainly will try to watch them all but the trailer for the upcoming
Yes, interviews with the people behind the beer, the beer writers and enthusiasts is all well and good, the 77 Portland Breweries crawl that producer John Lovegrove accomplished in one day (and filmed!) seems the much more fascinating facet of the film. I can’t imagine what he felt like halfway through the day let alone the next day, even if he drinks just one taster at each.
Oh and the logo and title needs to go.