Actors - Sideways

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	Actors - Sideways

Sideways is a 2004 Academy Award- winning and Golden Globe Award-winning comedy/drama film, co-written and directed by Alexander Payne. It is based on the novel of the same name by Rex Pickett (ISBN 0312324669).

Plot summary

Paul Giamatti plays an unpublished writer, eighth-grade English teacher, and oenophile named Miles, who takes his soon-to-be-married actor friend Jack (played by Thomas Haden Church) on a week-long road trip through Santa Ynez Valley wine country. Miles wants to drink wine, eat great food, play golf, and send Jack off in style. However, Jack is more interested in "sowing his wild oats" and have one last sexually libertine weekend. Soon after their arrival they meet Maya (Virginia Madsen) and Stephanie (Sandra Oh), who are friends.

Jack does not tell the women that he is going to marry that very weekend, and soon finds himself in a sexual and romantic imbroglio with Stephanie. Initially, however reticent Miles is, he's willing to entertain Jack's antics convinced of the temporary nature of his newfound relationship with Stephanie. Nevertheless, this relationship accelerates and a disapproving Miles grows frustrated, which turns him into a reluctant parental figure, a position that he has seem to have held before with Jack. In a slip-up, Miles tells Maya about the marriage; she in turn tells it to Stephanie, who becomes apoplectic and injures Jack in the face by repeatedly hitting him with her motorcycle helmet.

Miles hopes that this is the end of Jack's behavior, but undaunted, Jack manages to go home with another woman. Miles is awoken in the middle of the night by a naked Jack who confesses that her husband arrived, and he had to run home in the nude. His wallet with the wedding rings is still in the woman's house which Jack wants to get back with Miles' help. Initially, Miles is reluctant to help but sees the desperation in his friend's breakdown and agrees. It's later revealed on their car ride over, that Jack knew she was a married woman but it didn't deter him. This only irritates Miles, reminding him of Jack's immaturity. Miles is the one who personally retrieves the wallet by sneaking into the house to get it, passing along the couple having sex and subsequently chased down the street by the angry naked husband.

To finish off the weekend, Jack tricks Miles into letting him drive his car and running it into a tree in order to have corroborating evidence to go with his story that a car accident was the reason for his mangled face. The wedding not only confirms that Miles' ex-wife is happily re-married, but reveals that she is pregnant. This is the emotional climax of the film, leading Miles to skip the wedding reception to drink his prized bottle of wine, a 1961 Cheval Blanc, albeit out of a polystyrene cup at a fast food restaurant.

It seems that this is the end for Miles, but Maya finally returns his phone calls. She has read his manuscript and the letter that he has sent her, by leaving a message on his machine about how she can't believe the book was turned down as she admired the book very much. The movie ends with Miles knocking on her door.

Awards and nominations

Sideways won the following awards:
Academy Awards:

Best Adapted Screenplay (Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor
)

BAFTA Awards:

Adapted Screenplay (Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor)

Golden Globe Awards:

Best Motion Picture-Musical or Comedy
Best Screenplay

Gotham Awards:

Best Picture

National Board of Review of Motion Pictures:

Top Ten Film of 2004
Best Supporting Actor
Best Adapted Screenplay

IFP Independent Spirit Awards:

Best Male Lead
Best Supporting Male
Best Supporting Female
Best Screenplay
Best Director
Best Feature (won in all categories it was nominated for).

New York Film Critics Circle Awards:

Best Film

Screen Actors Guild Award:

Best Ensemble (Paul Giamatti
, Sandra Oh
, Thomas Haden Church
, and Virginia Madsen
).

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Sideways ]

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