What I like about this list of 100 Westerns off the Rotten Tomatoes website is that it gives you a nice broad spectrum of 'styles' of Western. One week, you can be watching John Wayne sternly plodding through the desert in bleak fifties splendour, the next you could be watching Leonardo DiCaprio crawling into a dead horse to keep warm in the Canadian wilderness, and then you get a week where you have to laugh along through gritted teeth as Owen Wilson and his punchable face acts like a twit for a couple of hours.
This week's wine, according to the A-Z checklist in my book, was a Carinena, Spanish and impossible to find, so I was relieved to find out that in France it is called Carignan and with them planting a lot more of the grape there, it was easier to get hold of.
Three weeks in a row though I've had a French wine, that seems kind of annoying.
It didn't really convince me this wine, but then again, I'd just enjoyed three pints down the Volunteer Arms with 'friend of the blog' Eddie Fogden, so perhaps my palette was all beered out. Having said that, I had no food in following a week a way so I had pizza, which my book didn't recommend as a 'pairing'. Still, if my Red Wine Book said 'Si, jump off a cliff', would I? Probably.
Wotists wise, I did what I didn't want to do when cheese is high on the agenda, and rolled a '6'. You WWWSI stattos might like to know out of the four times I've had pizza, I've rolled a 6 for Wotists on three of those occasions. Fascinating.
I'd bought a new Western tee shirt, and a new hat which made me look like a colourful cannabis fan. It was a bit tight on my big head, and gave me a bit of a headache (or it could've been the beer/wine/Wotsit/pizza overload).
Back to the wine, and yes, I just found it a bit 'thin' and unable to make a lasting impression. I read that in California, it sits on the table in restaurants, people drink it, but it goes largely unnoticed by name. Poor little Carignan!
With the Western hits on my mixtape courtesy of 'Uncle Matt' blaring out of my ancient stereo, I was in the mood and finally ready to settle down for Shanghai Noon.
No idea what happened in the film, I think I'd class as what 'they' call 'an enjoyable romp'. Again, that could be the beer before talking, but details are unclear. Lucy Liu got kidnapped when she thought she'd escaped, Jackie Chan went to save her, someone went rogue and buried Owen Wilson in the sand up to his neck, put chopsticks on his mouth to help him escape, then he teamed up with JC, they fell out a bit, but finally 'won 'the day' as you'd expect.
The film was ranked 36th on my list, but in terms of critic and audience reviews, it scored the lowest of all 15 films I've watched so far .......
At least we had a good pub/bar scene which as you know, is always my highlight.
Decent boozer really, but a startling lack of cask. Had elements of a Preston out of towner on the Ribble ...... not sure what tier it is in but some rules were not being observed .....
I then staggered back into the kitchen, and rolled the dice for next week's film. It brought out the film ranked at #1 in the list, which is The Treasure of Sierra Madre which I'd never heard of, but still the critics and fans obviously go wild for it, so we will see. Food will be buffet stuff, wine will be Camenere from Chile, and Wotists is a lower number than 6.
Thanks for your time partners, Si