RKS 2023 Wine: Cool Climate Cabernet Sauvignon from Chile’s Maule Valley

We move to another Chilean red wine a Rucahue Gran Reserva Cool Climate Cabernet Sauvignon from the Maule Valley in Chile.

The Maule Valley is Chile’s largest viticultural region which is one of the most geographically and climatically diverse encompassing the Andes to the east, the sunny plains through the central corridor and the rolling coastal hills to the west, which makes it possible for both red and white varieties to thrive. Unlike many other Chilean growing regions, the Maule Valley does not have maritime influences yet it maintains a favourable diurnal temperature differential.

Aroma: Some very rich blueberry and black cherry if you put your nose to it. Minimal streaks of raspberry floating around.

Palate: Tannins leaning toward the heavy side. More blueberry and black cherry but firmly knit and not flashing their stuff. Do you call that cloistered or discreet? I detect some struggle between the oak and the fruit. The oak strikes me as a bit raw. Not really an ideal sipping wine. Best off with food.

Cellarbility: Will handle well into 2025 but a difficult call to determine if it will improve. I find the oak a bit raw and not well integrated into the wine but that may just a matter of time.

Personality: I am super confident you will like me. This writer thinks I may be a gimped up by my oak and suggests I may integrate a bit better with my fruit in just a few more months. He is a brilliant guy. I agree completely!

Food Match: Grilled flank with chimichurri sauce with a red onion salad on the side.

Price: $24.95 (Ontario).

RKS 2023 Wine Rating: 87/100. Patricio Tapia 93.

(Rucahue Gran Reserva 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon, Maule Valley, Rucahue , San Javier, Chile, 750 mL, 14%, Liquor Control Board of Ontario # 27212).

RKS Literature: The Northern vs. Southern Temperament (Thomas Mann)

“My father, you know, had the temperament of the north; solid, reflective, puritanically correct, with a tendency to melancholia. My mother, of indeterminate foreign blood, was beautiful, sensuous, naïve, passionate, and careless at once, and, I think, irregular by instinct. The mixture was no doubt extraordinary and bore with it extraordinary dangers. The issue of it, a bourgeois who strayed off into art, a bohemian who feels nostalgic yearnings for respectability, an artist with a bad conscience. For surely it is my bourgeois conscience makes me see in the artist life, in all irregularity and genius, something profoundly suspect, profoundly disreputable: that fills me with this lovelorn faiblesse for the simple and the good, the comfortably normal, the average unendowed respectable human being.”

Thomas Mann, “Tonio Kröger”, 1903

RKS 2023 Wine: Miguel Torres Andica Gran Reserva 2020 Cabernet Sauvignon from Chile

This is an organic wine. It is from the Itata Valley which is Chile’s oldest viticultural region producing wine for over 450 years and Chardonnay and Cabernet Sauvignon are leading the new wave charge.

Aroma: Big pulses of blueberry with lesser notes of raspberry with Obidos Licor Ginja (sour cherry liqueur from Obidos in Portugal).

Palate: Moderate tannins in this full-bodied Cabernet Sauvignon. Blueberry rules both as fruit and also as blueberry pie! A grippy bit of milk chocolate coats the cheeks. The finish may not be long but it is super clean somewhat of a hallmark for any organic wine.

Personality: Hey man I am organic man! Clean living, healthy food and I meditate. I am far from a west coaster Lilliputian! I am a serious hipster.

Food match: While I go with beef, lamb and rich pasta sauces I can say avoid me with Parmesan cheese.

Cellarbility: Drinkable now. Hold until 2025.

Price: $17.

RKS 2023 Wine Rating: 92/100.

(Miguel Torres Andica Gran Reserva 2020 Cabernet Sauvignon, Vale Del Itata, Miguel Torres, Curicó, Chile, 750 mL, 13.5%, Liquor Control Board of Ontario # 25933).

RKS Literature: A Spirit of the Times? (Thomas Mann/Death in Venice)

“And after all, what kind could be truer to the spirit of the times? Gustave Aschenbach was the poet-spokesman of all those who labour at the edge of exhaustion; of the overburdened, of those who are already worn out but still hold themselves upright; of all our modern moralizers of accomplishment, with stunted growth and scanty resources, who yet contrive by skilful husbanding and prodigious spasms of will to produce, at least for awhile, the effect of greatness. There are many such, they are the heroes of the age.”

Thomas Mann, “Death in Venice”, 1911.

RKS 2023 Hot Docs Films: “Aitamaako’tamisskapi Natosi: Before the Sun”: I Can’t Believe I Am Saying This!

As a reviewer of films prior to taking up this all-consuming habit I often laughed years ago with a review or two of a film that trumpeted, “You’ll Stand Up and Cheer!”. I laugh no more as with this documentary I found myself standing up and cheering not physically but mentally. Why?

Firstly, as a reviewer of documentary films I have watched a plethora of documentaries on the exploitation and decimation of aboriginal populations in Brazil, the Philippines, Peru, Canada etc. It is a never-ending sorrow story. Drug addiction, substandard living conditions, disappearing habitats and on and on. Stereotyping of misery?

You will not find that dead head force in this documentary. A rare positive glimpse of aboriginal culture in Canada. It is so exciting, fulfilling , inspirational and it just lifts you above the stereotype of misery. In fact it is so good you may stand up physically or mentally and cheer at various points in the documentary. It may even cause an eruption of goosebumps!

Logan Red Crow is an Albertan Cree teenager who races horses bareback in relay teams. She has a supportive rancher family. A nervous father, a mother who puts her trust “above” and trainer brothers. These relay races are dangerous and you will see a few nasty spills. Logan Red Crow’s father has two relatives injured by horses. One is in a wheelchair and the other bedridden. Logan Red Crow loves and trusts her horses and there is mutual respect and understanding between horse and human!

Logan Red Crow just keeps improving until she reaches the world’s best “Indian” horse racing in the annual Casper Wyoming “Indian” horse race. Irrespective of the final result stand up and cheer for Logan Red Crow and the producers of this documentary.

A right on soundtrack that veers away from the maudlin and sappy. And well the cinematography is spectacular.

An entirely welcome take on aboriginal life in Canada. While we must not ignore the tragedies in aboriginal Canada surely we are entitled to cheer positivity. I am.

Directed by Banchi Hanuse.

It won the prestigious Big Sky Award at the 2023 Big Sky Documentary Festival in Montana.

This will play at the Toronto Hot Docs Festival on April 29th and May 3 and then will stream 5-9May.

RKS 2023 Film Rating 94/100.

RKS 2023 Wine: Yet Another Excellent Chilean Carmenère: Morandé 2020 Gran Reserva Carmenère

At $16.95 this wine is a steal. How long can Chilean red wine competitors stand in the face of such reasonable prices for full bodied red wine?

The wine has spent 18 months in French oak foudres.

Aroma: Freshly picked raspberries and raspberry jam shine through. Also blackberries and a bit of mocha.

Palate: Relaxed tannins. More of those raspberries with rich super ripe strawberries. Full bodied and just about at its prime although it would not protest if you kept it imprisoned for another year.

Personality: You know I have a fear you may be accustomed to excellent Chilean Carms. Boredom of excellence is a sin my dear reader. Embrace me. Don’t run!

Food match: Handicapped having not visited Chile (yet!) I can’t connect you with a Chilean cuisine match. But given the raspberry presence I think duck is a great match. Or possibly pork tenderloin medallions in a raspberry jam and Carmenére reduction sauce served over polenta.

Cellarbility: The wine will improve slightly through 2024 but consume by the end of 2025.

Price: $16.95 (Ontario).

RKS 2023 Wine Rating:  90/100. Natalie Maclean 91.

(Morandé Gran Reserva Carmenère 2020, D.O. Maipo Valley, Viña Morandé, Pelequén, Chile, 750 mL, 14%, Liquor Control Board of Ontario # 371112).

RKS 2023 Wine: More Cabernet Sauvignon from Chile: Aconcagua Alto Cabernet Sauvignon from Errazuriz

There is no mistaking Chilean Cabernet Sauvignon has upped its game over the past decade producing some very worthy examples. Fair to say they have not reached cult status as many Californian Cabernet Sauvignons have. Why is that? Could it be “over fascination” with those Cali Cabernet Sauvignons? Could it be the length of time the Californians have been on the market? Could it be the crowds of corporate lawyers and executives and physicians anxious to impress without having to mix Coca-Cola with Chateau La Sewer?

The grapes were grown in a vineyard 600 metres above sea level in loam and gravel.

Is this Errazuriz Aconcagua Alto 2019 Cabernet Sauvignon worthy of the lips of neurologists of the world? Their lips and palate may not be better than yours and mine but their wallets and egos may be bigger!

Aroma: More of that irrepressible Chilean raspberry one frequently encounters in Chilean red wine. Rich blueberry and black cherry with some gentle lavender notes.

Palate: A firm texture but no bullying by tannins. The firmness does restrain the fruit as the blackberry, black cherry and blueberry are there in the next room trying to get in. There is some juiciness to the wine aided and abetted by sweet red cherries that have partially opened the door of the adjoining room and it gives the wine a charming finish.

Food match: The label suggests, venison, wild boar and baby lamb. No need to quibble with that.  

Personality: A nun on vacation in Nice. Charming austerity.

Cellarbility: Needs at least another year in the bottle to open. Hold until 2026.

Price: $22.95.

RKS 2023 Wine Rating: 92/100. James Suckling 92.

(Errazuriz Aconcagua Alto Cabernet Sauvignon 2019, Viña Errazuriz, Panquehue, Chile, 750 mL, 13.5%, Liquor Control Board of Ontario # 203364).

RKS 2023 Films: “Living with Chucky”

I have lived all my years without Chucky. I am uncertain what thrill there is in these slasher films. Ooops sorry wrong horror genre! Slash and hacker doll genre? Sounding like a preacher and a geezer but how depraved to watch the murder of human beings and get a thrill out of it. Sorry I will admit I have yet to attend a Comicon. Now of course not including slashers and doll murderers in my viewing slate I must attend a global inclusion re-education camp along with those anti-vaxxers!

Despite my moralistic streak “Living with Chucky” is a fascinating dive into the Chucky franchise that started in 1988 with “Child’s Play” and followed with “Child’s Play 2”, “Child’s Play 3”, “Pride of Chucky”, “Seed of Chucky”, “Curse of Chuckie” et al. Nine puppeteers to get Chucky on his feet!

I suppose why not end it all with “Demise of Chucky”. Chucky may have filled in the boredom vacuum caused by an excess of classic slasher movies in the 1980’s but after 30 years of Chucky the doll still lumbers on without the use of digital animation!

You’ll get the opportunity to get up close and personal with the Chucky team ranging from creators, writers, producers, puppeteers, actors and fans. Chucky and his team are very close knit many of whom were children when Chucky appeared in 1988 and really did grow up with the cute “serial killer”.

So diss me for insulting a killer doll but David Kirschner a producer for Chucky films notes Chucky is based on Charles Manson, Lee Harvey Oswald and James Earl Ray. Chucky’s real name is Charles Lee Ray. So I see all those proud fans dressing up their children to look like Chucky it ranks even worse than drag kids.

Chucky fans once you stop throwing rotten tomatoes at me you’ll enjoy this documentary. And somewhat guiltily like Eve I’ll reach for “Child’s Play” and end up eating my shirt.

The living with the Chucky family and the personal sacrifices made by the Chucky family along with the sappy music at the conclusion of the documentary seem maudlin.

The documentary opens up in the United States and Canada on 4April on VOD platforms.

You can watch the trailer here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9KHG68Mn4io

RKS Film Rating 86/100.

RKS Literature: The Duel and Manhood

“The duel my friend, is not just any ‘arrangement’. It is the final arrangement, a return to the primal state of nature, only slightly moderated by certain chivalrous, but purely superficial rules. The essence of the situation remains what it has been since the beginning, a physical struggle, and it is each man’s duty, however far he may be from nature, to keep himself equal to the situation. Whomever is unable to  stand up for an ideal with his person, his arm, his blood, is unworthy of that ideal, and no matter how intellectual one may become, what matters is one remains a man. “

Thomas Mann, “The Magic Mountain”, 1914

RKS Literature: Individualism a Word for All Seasons

“Individualism was romantically medieval in its belief in the infinite, cosmic importance of each single creature, from which came the doctrine of the immortality of the soul, the theory of geocentrism and astrology. On the other hand, individualism was a matter of liberal humanism, which tended toward anarchy and wanted at all costs to protect the precious individual from being sacrificed to the interests of the whole. That was individualism, one thing and yet another, a word for all seasons,”

Thomas Mann, “The Magic Mountain”, 1914