Austin’s Alamo Drafthouse has a whole lot going on this month, including an Oscar nomination (Bullhead, released by Alamo’s distribution arm, picked up a best foreign language film nomination) and, as Alamo president Tim League discussed in a Q&A with the Austin American-Statesman‘s Gary Dinges, more franchises outside of Texas.
But the company’s best trick just might be a new addition to the Alamo wine list: the “Bottle of Wits” comes out just in time for Alamo’s The Princess Bride-themed Valentine’s Day pairing dinner and quote-along screenings in Austin, Houston, Dallas, and Virginia. (It’s actually a two-wine series: the “Inconceivable Cab” and the “As You Wish White.”)
“The ‘Battle of Wits’ sequence between Cary Elwes and Wallace Shawn easily stands toe-to-toe with ‘the Sideways Spit Bucket’ and ‘The Silence of the Lambs Chianti slurp’ as wine’s shining moment in film,” League said on Alamo’s website:
Alamo also notes that the Inconceivable Cab, a 2009 California Cabernet Sauvignon, “is complex & intriguing, with no trace of iocane powder.” Glasses go for $7 at Alamo ($28 for a whole bottle), and the wines (as well as accompanying “Bottle of Wits” shirts and wine charms) will also eventually be available online.
The wine bottles and packaging were created by Austin’s Helms Workshop, and, judging from a description of the project on their site, ought to be the first of many:
In looking at developing an identity for Alamo’s in-house branded wines, we quickly decided that it would be impossible to sum up everything that makes the Alamo unique in a single packaging system. Why not redesign the wine each year, based on a film that aligns with the brand?
Which means it’s not too soon to ask, what should the 2013 bottling be, and might there be a different, red, white (and perhaps even pink) for different movies? No reason to limit them to wine-themed cinematic moments either. A nice blood-purple fruit bomb for the next Quentin Tarantino or Robert Rodriguez screening seems in order
