style="font-weight: bold;">Wine Reviews

style="font-weight: bold;">with Jean Smullen ( href="http://www.jeansmullen.com">www.jeansmullen.com)

The last weekend before the summer holidays end and the kids go back to school. Autumn is almost here so I thought I’d go for something a little different this week.  An Italian white wine from Tuscany  made from  the Vermentino grape first, followed by a full bodied wine made from organically grown grapes from one of Chile’s leading organic producers as our red wine.

2011 Poggio Del Sasso Vermentino  IGT Toscana RRP  €12.99

Stockists ”“ Drink Store ”“ Stoneybatter;  J M Vintners ”“ Rush; Fallon & Byrne ”“ D2; Donnybrook Fair;  Williams and Allen ”“ Dundrum; The Parting Glass ”“ Enniskerry; Callans Off Licence ”“ Dundalk;  Bradleys – Cork, World Wide Wines ”“ Waterford; The Vineyard ”“ Galway and href="http://www.thewineshop.ie">www.thewineshop.ie .

The Cantina di Montalcino is a very good Italian winery that was founded in 1975  and bought by the co-operative Cantine Leonardo in 1990.  The fruit for this wine  is grown in Southern Tuscany in the Grosetto province.

Vermentino  is an Italian varietal that can be found extensively throughout the regions of Sardinia, Corsica, and on the Italian Riviera (Liguria). Vermentino is a very aromatic grape.  It has citrus fruits, a herbaceous character and a slight nutty.  The wine style is typically Italian crisp and acidic.

The wine was cold fermented in temperature controlled tanks.  This is a process the Italian’s use for their white wines.  Most Italian white wine tends to be quite neutral.  This particular wine though has a lot more flavour and structure to it.

The nose is quite floral, but when you taste this wine there is a spicy savoury character to it and a wonderful layer of acidity that gives the wine a great lift. A great wine to serve with fish!   Try it with a seasonal dish like  fresh mackerel served with gooseberry sauce, or with a slightly href="http://www.yummly.com/recipes/teriyaki-fish-stir-fry"> spicy fish stir fry.

A Tribute to Jammets of Dublin will take place on Thursday 4th October, 2012 at 7.00 p.m. in the Shelbourne Hotel. It promises to be a magical musical evening where 350 music lovers will be invited to reminisce and recall the glorious days of Jammet’s, the most famous French Restaurant in Dublin (1901-1967). A Jammet’s style Gala Dinner will be served.  This is a Charity Fundraising Event. All funds raised will benefit The Jack & Jill Children’s Foundation.  For more information This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it  contact Dearbhla Meaney 086 822 1751 email href="mailto:Info@whitediamondevents.org">Info@whitediamondevents.org

2009 Eco Balance Syrah  Cabernet Sauvignon Merlot

DO Rapel Valley RRP €10.99

Stockists: href="http://www.tindalwine.com">www.tindalwine.com Ardkeen Quality Foodstore, Ardkeen, Waterford Baggot Street Wines, Dublin 4; Brady’s Off Licence, Shankill, Co. Dublin; Daly’s Off Licence, Boyle, Roscommon; Donnybrook Fair chain; D-Six Off Licence, Harold’s Cross, Dublin 6w; The Village Food Fare, Collooney, Co. Sligo; Hargadon Bros., Sligo; JM Vintners, Rush, Co. Dublin ; Market 57, Westport, Co. Mayo; Morton’s, Salthill, Galway; Morton’s, Ranelagh, Dublin 6; Next Door Off Licence, Kilkee, Co. Clare; Nolan’s. Kilcullen, Co. Kildare; O’Leary’s, Cootehill, Co. Cavan; Swans on the Green, Naas, Co. Kildare

Eco is a collection of quality everyday wines.   The company who make this wine Vina Emiliana use sustainability and an earth-friendly focus when growing the grapes that produce this wine. Healthy grapes and beautiful vineyards, teeming with life deliver these engaging wines from the valleys of Chile. Instead of stark, sterile rows of vines, the vineyards are buzzing with birds, bees, insects and native wildlife providing a natural, effective defence against common vine-destroying insects.

Chemicals are replaced by natural products and compost is produced from grape skins and stems, vegetal residue and manure. Harmony with nature are reflected in  the Eco Balance range .

Rafael and José Guilisasti  who founded Emiliana were visionaries in the late 1990s when they saw that the market was beginning to change and that consumers worldwide were becoming more aware of the products they were consuming. They asked winemaking consultant Alvaro Espinoza to join them in the process of converting a conventional Chilean winery into one that was 100% organic and biodynamic with the firm objective of creating wines of the highest quality with great respect for nature. Now, after more than a decade, what began as a dream has become a complete portfolio of wines backed by major national and international awards and recognition and that meet the new need of today’s consumers.

This wine is a blend of three French grape varieties,  it has Syrah,  Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot in the blend.  Intense aromas of cherry, spice and coffee backed by a little vanilla are to be found in this.  Ideal for serving with any kind of meat, cheese or pate, this is a full bodied wine with lots of flavour and up front fruit.

Wine Events  go the wine diary href="http://www.jeansmullen.com">www.jeansmullen.com

Riedel Comparative Wine Tasting at The Miele Gallery, Citywest, Dublin 24. On Wednesday 29th August 2012. Tickets can be bought in Mitchells Wine Shops Tel: 01 6125540 (CHQ Shop) or 01 2302301 (Glasthule Shop) more details w href="http://www.mitchellandson.com/">www.mitchellandson.com

Movie Reviews

Shadow Dancer (15A) ****

Andrea Riseborough, Clive Owen, David Wilmot, Aidan Gillen, Domhnall Gleeson.

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Set in 1990s Belfast, Colette (Riseborough) is persuaded to spy on top ranking IRA members by a top British agent (Owen).

BRITISH director James Marsh has already won many awards for such acclaimed documentaries as Man on Wire, the story of a daredevil walk between New York’s Twin Towers, and Project Nim, the controversial project undertaken on a chimp.

Now he’s turning his hand to the testy world of the Troubles in this impressive drama. He coaxed fine performances out of an excellent cast. But Marsh’s greatest achievement is that this is a human drama first, a political thriller second.

Most of the movie was actually shot in Dublin, with gritty housing estates in the Capital substituting for Belfast.

By keeping the story intimate and character driven, Marsh manages to avoid the usual pitfall of being sympathetic to one cause that is often levelled at directors who dare make a movie about the Troubles.

This is essentially a blend of drama and thriller that happens to be set in the North and it’s based on a novel, rather than a true story.

There has been a lot of hype about young English actress Andrea Riseborough since she played Wallis Simpson in WE last year, and she is very good here as the movie’s central character, Colette McVeigh.

The tense opening scene sees her caught red handed while attempting to plant a bomb on the Tube network in London, which brings her onto the radar of an MI5 officer named Mac (Owen).

A single mother who lives on a working class estate in Belfast with her mother and hardline IRA brothers (Gillen and Gleeson), Colette finds herself in a very vulnerable position.

Mac presents her with a very stark choice  -  lose her son and spend twenty five years in prison, or go home to Belfast and act as an informant on her own brothers.

The timing of the movie, set in the early 1990’s, adds an interesting element to the story. With mentions of a potential peace process being mooted, the period marks a link between the future and the past. The secret service, she is told, is merely interested in keeping things calm.

Convinced by Mac that she will be protected and there will be no bloodshed, Colette agrees to watch her brothers’ movements. But things go badly wrong when a secret operation is ambushed, convincing the IRA that there is a mole and leaving the entire family in grave danger.

Shadow Dancer is by no means a flawless film. The pacing’s a little leisurely at times, even for a drama-driven thriller. Some iffy plot twists will require movie goers to take a leap of faith, while the character of Colette is almost too sympathetic  -  she would have been much more interesting if we got to see more evidence of her ruthlessness.

But as a tense, atmospheric drama thriller it works exceptionally well, and shows Marsh has the potential to be as great a features director as he is a documentary maker.

The Three Stooges (PG) **

Chris Diamantopoulos, Sean Hayes, Will Sasso, Larry David, Sofia Vergara.

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PETER AND ROBERT Farrelly found success with gross-out comedy hits like There’s Something About Mary coupled with slapstick humour like Dumb and Dumber.

But the hits have been less frequent in recent years  -  and this slight take on the hit comedy trio from the 1940 is unlikely to turn things around.

Such big names as Sean Penn, Benicio Del Toro and of course, Jim Carrey were originally attached to this film, which the Farrellys have been trying to get made for years.

Larry, Curly and Mo grow up in an orphanage where their antics create havoc for the nuns (lead by David and mother superior Jane Lynch) who run the place. When an adoption attempt leads to them all ending up back in the orphanage, we meet them again 25 years later. With the orphanage facing closure, they have just 30 days to raise over $800,000 to save their home and the other kids.

To be fair to the project, it’s not the dead loss that some US critics have described it as, and the three leads nail the comic timing and slapstick that are crucial to the film. But the lack of a story makes this feel far longer than its 90 minute running time, and placing the trio in a modern contemporary setting just doesn’t work.

The slapping, kicking, nosepulling and pratfalling is executed extremely well, but the Farrellys never develop the movie enough to make this memorable. Lazy.