'Lights, camera, action ...'
Feature film to be shot in Sonoma
By David Bolling INDEX-TRIBUNE EDITOR

It will be called "Bottle Shock," famed English actor Alan Rickman will star, and it will be shot mostly in Sonoma and Napa, partly around the Plaza.
Rickman is the famed star of countless British stage productions, as well as numerous films, including the original "Die Hard," "Robin Hood," "Love Actually," and most notably of late, the "Harry Potter" series in which he plays the oily Severus Snape.

"Bottle Shock" is the brainchild of Brenda Lhormer who, with her husband, Marc, has been a driving force behind the Sonoma Valley Film Festival. The film chronicles the events leading up to the famous Paris Tasting of 1976, at which California wines bested the exalted French wines in a blind tasting organized by Steven Spurrier, a Paris wine merchant.

The film unfolds through the lives of father and son, Jim and Bo Barrett, who founded Chateau Montelena in the early 1970s and whose chardonnay, made by winemaker Mike Grgich, went on to win the white wine competition in what was eventually coined "The Judgment of Paris." The red wine winner was a 1973 vintage from Stag's Leap.
"Bottle Shock" will be directed by Randall Miller, whose career has been primarily in television, but who directed the film "Marilyn Hotchkiss Ballroom Dancing and Charm School," which opened the Sonoma Valley Film Festival in 2006.

Miller and his wife, Jody Savin, reworked the original "Bottle Shock" script and Savin is now one of the film's producers.

Filming will be done primarily at Sonoma wineries, as well as in Glen Ellen and Calistoga. There will be some filming in downtown Sonoma around the Plaza on Aug. 22 and 27 that will close down portions of East Napa Street. Foot traffic will be minimally affected and traffic will be rerouted. Filming will include the Ledson Hotel, the Swiss Hotel and Toscano. Businesses impacted by the shooting schedule will be fairly compensated for any demonstrable losses.

Numerous local extras will be hired to augment the 50-person cast. Some 10 to 20 actors will be hired from Sonoma and San Francisco.
Some 18 crew members are already in Sonoma, renting local lodging, and a production office has been set up on Eighth Street East.

The release date for the film has not been set, but Lhormer said the Sundance Film Festival will be an early venue, along with other key festivals, to build interest in the film and drive distribution deals in 2008.