2004: Sideways (Best of the Noughties Lists and Suggestions #9)

The film about two middle-aged buddies who go on a trip to the Santa Barbara wine country before one of them gets married only to predictably become involved with two local ladies is well written, well photographed, well acted and succeeds all around in what it's trying to do: to provide an entertaining, easily digested film for people with brains, the kind of moviegoers who fancy neither the usual blockbusters aimed at their children nor the Masterpieces of Finnish Existentialism currently playing at the local arthouse. (7.5)