Yet Red Obsession’s story, it soon turns out, isn’t simply about the illustrious alcohol created in the Bordeaux region. Rather, it’s also about how the region’s five eminent châteaus, now pricing their products so high that they’ve become lucrative investments for the wealthy, have been forced to turn to the Chinese market to sustain their businesses. As Roach and Ross lay out with a clarity devoid of intrusive authorial judgment, that change of direction has been very profitable for the wine makers, since China—rich with cash and preoccupied with brand names as a means of affirming power and social prominence—has been an enormous importer of the finest that Bordeaux has to offer.
If China’s rise to wine-consuming powerhouse is a boon for the Bordeaux region, Red Obsession also shrewdly presents it as something of a double-edged sword. Unlike those centuries-old bonds shared between the renowned vineyards and their long-established customers, the new Bordeaux-China relationship is built on pure capitalism and thus susceptible to becoming just a fad. Furthermore, given the growth of China’s middle class, it’s now complicated by demand outpacing supply. Grotesque portraits of a few insanely rich Chinese collectors—including one who made his fortune via sex toys—underline the fact that some of the East views wine less as a delicacy than as merely another status symbol.
By detailing the stark contrast between Bordeaux’s peerless 2010 output and its staggeringly disappointing 2011 harvest, Roach and Ross effectively depict the wine industry as being predicated on the uncertainty of both nature and international financial conditions. More impressive still, the directors illustrate through conventional aesthetics how, when in the proper hands, the most time-honored methods can also be the most effective.
