{"id":9946,"date":"2024-12-11T17:29:13","date_gmt":"2024-12-11T22:29:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/?p=9946"},"modified":"2024-12-11T17:29:13","modified_gmt":"2024-12-11T22:29:13","slug":"wine-country","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/2024\/12\/11\/wine-country\/","title":{"rendered":"Wine Country"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Wine Country <\/strong>(2019)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Netflix\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 103 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (crude sexual content, language, some drug material)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Amy Poehler\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Emily Spivey and Liz Cackowski\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Tom Magill\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: May 8, 2019 (US & Netflix)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Rachel Dratch, Ana Gasteyer, Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph, Paula Pell, Emily Spivey, Jason Schwartzman, Tina Fey, Cherry Jones, Maya Erskine.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Box Office: N\/A<\/p>\n

Rating<\/strong>: **<\/p>\n

\u00a0The Amy Poehler-directed comedy Wine Country<\/strong> centers on a group of female friends who come together to celebrate a milestone birthday (the big 5-0) of one of their own with a weekend trip to Napa Valley. They\u2019ve been friends for half their lives. They first met when they worked as waitresses as a pizza restaurant. Given their age and the music they listen to, I\u2019m shocked they never once bring up Mystic Pizza, the 1988 female-bonding dramedy (also set among waitresses at a pizza place) that likely inspired this so-so movie starring several alumni of 00s-era SNL. With all the great comedic talent in Wine Country<\/strong>, you\u2019d think it couldn\u2019t possibly miss. Unfortunately, it does.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Poehler, making her directorial debut, stars as Abby, a recently unemployed career woman who puts together a birthday trip for Rebecca (Dratch) despite her wishes to keep things low-key. Joining them are their friends: Naomi (Rudolph), Catherine (Gasteyer), Val (SNL writer Pell) and Jenny (SNL writer Spivey). All of them are dealing with personal problems. Rebecca\u2019s marriage sucks (her husband is inattentive). Naomi is having a health crisis; she\u2019s afraid to call her doctor to get results of a test. Catherine is a total workaholic. She spends more time talking to her smart phone than to her friends. Val, a lesbian, just had knee replacement surgery and feels especially spry. She tries to initiate a relationship with a younger woman, waitress\/artist Jade (Erskine, PEN15). Jenny is a pill. She\u2019s depressed, pessimistic and doesn\u2019t want to be on this trip. And what a trip it is. Abby has a full itinerary to which she demands strict adherence.<\/p>\n

\u00a0That\u2019s really all there is to Wine Country<\/strong> in terms of plot. Other characters, like Tammy (Fey), the gruff but wise owner of the house they\u2019re renting for the weekend, drift in and out of the picture. We also meet a cranky tarot card reader called Lady Sunshine (Jones, 24). The only significant male character is Devon (Schwartzman, Rushmore), the chef\/chauffeur that \u201ccomes with the house\u201d. He does little else than drive them around and cook a paella that never seems to be done. Oh yeah, he has sex with Abby too. Other than that, he\u2019s repeatedly told to shut up and stay quiet. Do I sense an anti-male agenda here? Or am I reading too much into Wine Country<\/strong>?<\/p>\n

\u00a0I can count the times I laughed at Wine Country<\/strong> on one finger. There\u2019s a funny bit involving Jade\u2019s art exhibit. Its theme is a popular 90s sitcom. It leads to the movie\u2019s best line, a play on the main character\u2019s name. The line made me laugh. The rest of the time I toggled between mild amusement and mild-plus annoyance. Poehler\u2019s character got on my nerves as did a few others. Vacations are supposed to be fun, but none of the trippers seem to be having any. I realize that\u2019s the point of Wine Country<\/strong>, but does that mean the movie has to be a drag too? It doesn\u2019t have to.<\/p>\n

\u00a0My dislike of Wine Country<\/strong> could be that it\u2019s a movie for women. It could be argued that, as a man, I don\u2019t get \u201cfemale issues\u201d. Okay, fair point. Let me approach it this way. I doubt I\u2019d like Wine Country<\/strong> if it featured men instead of women. Sure, it would be a completely different movie. In all likelihood, it would turn into an overgrown frat boy-type comedy with men guzzling beer, talking dirty, playing dumb pranks and chasing women too young for them. It would probably star Adam Sandler and his usual gang of idiots. Some guys might like that movie; I\u2019m not one of them. That is, unless it turned out to be legit funny like Road Trip or Blockers. All I\u2019m saying is that gender doesn\u2019t play into my opinion of Wine Country<\/strong>. I simply don\u2019t like it very much.<\/p>\n

\u00a0The 70s\/80s\/90s infused soundtrack isn\u2019t too bad. Among the vintage tunes you\u2019ll hear in Wine Country<\/strong> are \u201cMagic\u201d (Olivia Newton-John), \u201cKids in America\u201d (Kim Wilde), \u201cWe\u2019re All Alone\u201d (Rita Coolidge), \u201cFalling\u201d (LeBlanc and Carr) and, one I hate, \u201cPoison\u201d (Bell Biv DeVoe). The female leads sing Prince\u2019s \u201cI Would Die 4 U\u201d over the end credits. I actually liked that. BTW, this is the second Amy Poehler movie to reference Xanadu (the first was 2015\u2019s Sisters). Do you think she likes that movie?<\/p>\n

\u00a0I have no doubt Poehler is capable of making a decent comedy. She\u2019s a funny lady. It\u2019s a shame Wine Country<\/strong> didn\u2019t turn out better. Maybe there was too relaxed an attitude on the set. The lead actresses are friends in real life. Perhaps Wine Country<\/strong> is nothing more than an excuse for them to work together again after SNL? In which case, maybe I\u2019m being too hard on it. But the truth is still the truth regardless. I couldn\u2019t get into Wine Country<\/strong>. It\u2019s okay, but it\u2019s nothing I need to see again.\"\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Wine Country (2019)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Netflix\/Comedy\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 RT: 103 minutes\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Rated R (crude sexual content, language, some drug material)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Director: Amy Poehler\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Screenplay: Emily Spivey and Liz Cackowski\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Music: Wendy Melvoin and Lisa Coleman\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cinematography: Tom Magill\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Release date: May 8, 2019 (US & Netflix)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Cast: Rachel Dratch, Ana Gasteyer, Amy Poehler, Maya Rudolph, Paula Pell, Emily Spivey, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":10313,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-comedies"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/Wine-Country-PIC.jpg?fit=620%2C348&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9946"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10315,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9946\/revisions\/10315"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10313"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/movieguy247.com\/MovieGuy\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}