Still Sideways
20 Years Later

The worst thing about the film industry's current obsession with blockbusters and familiar IP is that we no longer get fun, mid-budget movies like Sideways. This 2004 dramedy is a very human story about two guys getting into trouble right before one of them gets married. We rarely get stories like these anymore.

The cast is a reminder of that, too. Paul Giamatti, Sandra Oh, Thomas Haden Church, and Virginia Madsen are all brilliant actors, and they thrive in character-driven stories where the writing and the acting do the heavy lifting. Movies like Sideways depend on exactly that kind of craft, and I actually like those kinds of performances more. I got more starstruck meeting this cast than I ever did with bigger blockbuster names.

The movie celebrated its 20th anniversary with various events in 2024, and I went to a couple of them just to see the cast in person. The first was when Sandra Oh presented Paul Giamatti with the Icon Award at the Palm Springs International Film Awards on January 4, 2024. It wasn't an official Sideways event, but seeing them together was the Sideways reunion I've always wanted.

I covered the event for the magazine I worked for at the time, and I brought my Sideways movie poster along to ask them to sign. They were pretty nice about it, and they also spoke briefly about the film and what it meant to them 20 years later.

Later that October, CIA at Copia, the Culinary Institute of America's Napa hub, held a special screening and dinner for the film on October 12, with Virginia Madsen and director Alexander Payne in conversation afterward. I would've loved to see Giamatti, Oh, and Haden Church there too for a more complete reunion, but since I'd already met Giamatti and Oh earlier, I wasn't too mad. I also liked that they staged this anniversary event. Sideways isn't exactly the kind of movie that usually gets these anniversary and tribute events. It's usually films like The Godfather, Titanic, or even The Lion King.

I had a great time seeing the movie again that night, this time with part of the cast and the director in the room. I also enjoyed hearing them talk about making the film and its impact on them and on cinema as a whole since then. And of course, getting their autographs on the same poster was the best.

Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor really deserved the Best Adapted Screenplay Oscar they won. Watching it 20 years later, most of the dialogue still holds up. I'm also a whole generation younger than the characters, but I still related to what they went through. Not necessarily the antics they got into, but the journeys they were on as adults.

I hope we get more movies like Sideways. Don't get me wrong! I like fantasy movies and franchise adaptations as much as anyone, but I also want messy, realistic, relatable, human stories. Movie audiences deserve that balance!