“He followed me into the bathroom, peeling a banana. “Depressing, I was cranking up on a new poem when some dipshit called, trying to sell us a storage freezer. Writing is a lot like dreaming, you know? There’s a subconscious connection, you know. Once someone intrudes, it’s like trying to go back to sleep to finish your dream.” He yawned so wide I saw the chewed-up banana.”
Wally Lamb, “She’s Come Undone” (1992).
John Marynissen might be categorized as a Niagara wine legend but he’s long gone and at last account the winery is in the hands of a Chinese investors, I think. The winery website states the winery was sold in 2012 but for some reason (wonder why) fails to reveal the identity of the purchaser(s).
Whatever, the legend has passed on long ago and my take of the current stable of wines has been rock bottom. But I am willing to give a last chance try to their “Charmed Rosé” from the Heritage Collection which as the label states, “pays homage to our pioneering founders by maintaining their traditions or continuing in their spirit through innovation.” 92% Cabernet Franc, 4% Gewurtz and 4% Riesling.
Aroma: Strawberry, raspberry, watermelon and cranberry to this brickish pink tank sparkler. Brick can be a sign of ageing or oxidization.
Palate: Not a sharp bite but a bite nonetheless. A tired very slightly oxidized taste and hard to pin down any fruit.
Personality: Give me a break. It is hard to emulate a legend.
Food Match: A peameal bacon sandwich but no fancy mustard please.
Cellarbility: Drink now before the tariffs set in!
Price: $24.95 CDN (Hmmmmm?)
RKS 2025 CANADIAN Wine Rating: 84/100. Wine Align Community Rating 86. Natalie MacLean 90.
(Marynissen Estates 2022 Charmed Rosé, VQA Ontario, Marynissen, Niagara-on-the-Lake, 750 ml, 11.5%).
“Ashley pulled at her mother’s pant leg and Paula bent down to hear the secret. “Well, Ashley, maybe next time you’ll listen to Mommy about drinking too much pineapple juice. Come on we’ll just have to tinkle behind the car.” “But I don’t have to tinkle. I have to make a stinky.”
Wally Lamb, “She’s Come Undone” (1992).
From Nemea in the Peloponnese a “oak aged” Agiorgitiko. Having been in Thessaloniki in November for the Thessaloniki 65th Annual Film Festival I found perhaps the best wine shop right by the main port buildings. The red wine leader on the shelves was Agiorgitiko and the same held true for supermarket and the smaller corner stores.
We try an Agiorgitiko from Zacharias Winery with “oak aged” shouting at you from the label which also states it has aged 12 months in French oak barrels.
Aroma: Indeed, a healthy waft up of oak which is preferable to a stink up. Black cherry, raspberry on steroids and black currant.
Palate: Quite a firm bite. Harsh and count your blessings the tannins are moderate. Black cherry, Vermont black licorice and cactus pear. Best with food.
Personality: A munga wine.
Food Match: Beef Stifado.
Cellarbility: Consume by 2026.
RKS 2025 Wine Rating: 84/100.
(Zacharias Agiorgitiko 2021 Oak Aged, AOP Nemea, Zachárias Winery, Peloponnese, Greece, 750 mL, 14%).
“Unwelcomed” is yet another migrant crisis examined. During the COVID pandemic some 8 million Venezuelans migrants poured out of their economically and politically failing country. Some 300,000 Venezuelan undocumented migrants are presently in Chile.
The journey is perilous fraught with gang robbery, murder and rape but the promised land lures the migrants. But what awaits them is no land of milk and honey. The documentary reveals a solid streak of anti-migrantism in Chile based on fear and economic and social reality that Chile simply can’t accommodate huge masses of migrants.
We hear some of the Venezuelan migrant stories, watch the anti-migrant demonstrations and attacks, see the innocent smiling children, cringe at the squatting settlements and marvel at the spectacular topography of the Atacama Desert and its highlands, the Andean Highlands and coastal Chile. A juxtaposition of natural beauty somewhat marred by incessant shots of garbage littered everywhere) and quiet migrant desperation.
The camera does all the work here. No commentary or narration other than the migrant stories and the unwelcoming sentiment of many Chileans.
The Venezuelan exodus is the largest in modern history followed by the Ukraine and Syria.
Directed by Sebastian González Mendez and Amilcar Infante.
Screens 30April/3May2025
RKS 2025 Documentary Rating 92/100.
Chilean microbiologist Professor Cristina Dorador rings the alarm bell many others have been ringing for decades. The wholesale and indiscriminate use of antibiotics has given those bad microbes it once easily defeated an opportunity to mutate and resist antibiotics killing an estimated five million people a year.
We follow Dorador on an expedition to the Atacama Desert in Chile home of a diverse but dwindling variety of microorganisms she believes may be the foundation for a “superbug” defeating antibiotic.
Chilean governmental approvals for lithium mining in the Atacama region is destroying the environment and indigenous culture and their economy including the possible miracle microorganisms that would place antibiotics ahead of the mutation game.
The world’s obsession of lithium to power batteries creates lithium demand and obsequious to commercial interests’ Chilean government promotion of lithium mining in the Atacama may be destroying the development of a new generation of antibiotics.
The question of what would happen if miracle microorganisms were unearthed in the Atacama is not broached. A new “mining” of them equally destructive to the Atacama?
Tremendous cinematography of the Atacama Desert!
This 20-minute short documentary is a U.K., Chilean and Swedish co-production and is directed by Bettina Perut and Iván Osnovikoff.
“Life Invisible” will have its world premiere 29April/2May2025.
RKS 2025 Documentary Rating 64/100.
The short documentary “La Femme Equi-Libre” focuses on the Elm Grove Centre in the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island run by Josée Gallant Gordon a graduate social worker.
Gordon offers equine therapy to mental health patients and in lieu of tranquilizing patients with enough tranquilizers to kill a horse the horse and therapist play centre stage where medication and standard therapy has proven ineffective which two veteran participants suffering from PTSD attest to stating the horses relax you, always have your back, make you see things differently and permits a focus for what works for you instead of having that defined by a therapist. Equine exposure works wonders in ways the documentary only grazes on.
One client explains in an office setting with a therapist you are in a constrained space forced to interact with your therapist but with a horse one can divert your attention and ruminate with the horse as a buffer between yourself and the therapist. Equine therapy is used for some United States veterans so it is not a novel concept but it is encouraging it is a therapeutic strategy also used in Canada.
Directed by Hélène Lebon and is part of the Hot Docs Citizen minutes screening on 30April2025.
RKS CANADIAN Documentary Rating 66/100.
Alex Nguyen, a Vietnamese Winnipegger, struggled with his queerness at an early age. His progression into drag queen Ruby Chopstix was fraught with self doubt.
Alex became the first resident drag artist of Winnipeg’s The Rainbow Resource Centre’s “Drag Artist in Residence” supporting drag artists to uplift “a beautiful form of queerness and culture” through a $2,000 stipend to fund living costs, investments in Alex’s art and to create a project to promote drag. In short it promotes the transition of Alex Nguyen into drag performer Ruby Chopstix.
His showcase performance includes his mother and backup dancers.
As for drag you can take it or leave it but whatever “side” you are on Ruby’s determination to advance drag as an inspiration to people to be themselves is notable and Drag Artist in Residence innovative.
The documentary might have warranted further discussion on the hostility displayed by some to drag performances and how Drag Artist in Residence was founded and financially supported.
There was brief Pansy Craze in New York, London, Paris, Berlin and San Francisco in the late twenties and early thirties weakened in part by the Roman Catholic church attacking it. Who is currently attacking drag art and their rationale for doing so would have added a little more depth to this documentary.
Directed by Quan Luong and part of Hot Docs Citizen Minutes screening on 30April2025.
RKS CANADIAN Documentary Rating 71/100.
Watching American news in the past few years and speaking with Americans, most recently in California, one senses a polarized nation where a 6Jan21 riot was illustrative of a greater shade of polarization namely extremism. Rioters seen by some as “patriots” and by others as criminal insurrectionists. As to politics and related points of view the United States seems acrimoniously split into two warring sides.
Two Canadian women AS and KM have widely diverging viewpoints on almost all issues. They travel to Wisconsin for an annual convention of Braver Angels realizing society and democracy may be splitting into destructive irreconcilability.
Braver Angels does not seek to change or erase points of view or to obtain agreements as to what is right but like marriage therapists tries to connect bickering couples by determining what each side thinks so they can reconnect with other and move forward.
The result is AS and KM are now good friends and trying to expand the presence of Braver Angels into Canada.
Perhaps it amounts to that old saying agree to disagree.
Chrisann Hessing and Ashley Brooke are the directors of the short documentary “Crossing the Divide” which is part of Hot Docs Citizen Minutes Programme screening on 30April2025.
RKS CANADIAN Documentary Rating 77/100.
Joyce Jonathan Crone a Haudenosaunee, Mohawk, Turtle Clan from the Huntsville area in Ontario is, amongst many things, an activist, columnist, radio show host, writer and member of the Indigenous Advisory Council of the Ontario Provincial Police. She is founder of the Hope Arises Project which is committed to promoting a connection to Indigenous culture for those expressing loss or interruption of cultural identity. Hope Arises Project seeks to address cultural misconceptions and barriers and envisions a community fostering cultural parity, diversity and acceptance.
“Red Girl Rising” affords Crone an opportunity to tell viewers her story. The short documentary is one of the seven in the Citizen Minutes Programme.
Her father attended a residential school in Ontario and was severely traumatized by the experience as is Crone. Residential school trauma is intergenerational a message which is very much a message of the documentary.
Given the genocidal intent of residential schools all Canadians surely must understand the anger of Indigenous people in Canada. Crone was the victim of racist bullying based on her skin colour. Crone recognizes the necessity of understanding and educating about past abuses but cautions a sole focus on the past amounts to stuck wheels and one avoidance strategy of the spinning wheels is community involvement with Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. To potential allies she states to be an ally you must stand close enough to feel the rocks being thrown.
A short but powerful and telling recounting of a woman seeking to change the future by education, community involvement and reconciliation despite her own trauma and her anger so evident in a final drum beating scene.
Directed by Kim Stadfeld and Faith Howe.
The Citizen Minutes Programme screens 30April2025.
RKS CANADIAN Documentary Rating 81/100.
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