Review of Sideways (2004) by Wesley W — 26 Mar 2015

Watching this film again, I have nothing but love and great words to describe it. Everything about Sideways stands out. The acting from the entire cast, the story, Alexander Payne's excellent directing, the gorgeous cinematography, Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor's fantastic thoughtful script, and the beautiful score that is present.

Paul Giamatti and Thomas Haden Church give career best performances and they had killer chemistry on screen as Miles and Jack. The simple story of them traveling out to wine country had me engaged from the very beginning to the very end.

The dialogue gives all the characters depth and you care about them all. Another thing that made the movie all the more meaningful to me was it's emotional core. The drama had me really caring about the characters and what was gonna happen to them.

The conversations were so full of meaning and life and there was no one single boring conversation. I could not be more happy that the screenplay won an oscar because it is probably one of my favorites of the 00's era.

The nominations given to Alexander Payne, Virginia Madsen, and Thomas Haden Church were also highly well deserved and I even thought that Paul Giamatti deserved a oscar nomination as well. Virginia Madsen and Sandra Oh were interesting love interests for the main leads and they never came off as caricatures.

Another aspect that also shined was the comedy. There were lines of dialogue and situations that had humor to them and had me laughing. What this movie also did was give me a good knowledge on wine. Paul Giamatti's character knows a whole lot about wine and it provided for more interesting dialogue.

The cinematography was truly stunning to look at. Here, you get to see beautiful sights of the vineyards of California and also great shots of the city right before the leads travel out on their trip.

Overall, it takes a lot for me to wanna give a movie 5 out of 5 stars and this one accomplished that goal in my eyes. This a masterful piece of filmmaking and probably the best film to come out in 2004 in my opinion.