“Master of the Vine”, the film about Riccardo Cotarella’s life and profession as a winemaker

The life story of one of Italy’s greatest oenologists ends up on the big screen, in a tale made up of many testimonials from celebrities, whose wines he often signs, successes, and images that highlight the beauty of a world, the world of wine, that he also helped make great. All of this is in “Master of the vine”, the film dedicated to Riccardo Cotarella, current president of Assoenologi and co-president of Union Internationale des Oenologues, co-founder of the winery Famiglia Cotarella, together with his brother Renzo, and today led by their daughters, Dominga, Marta and Enrica Cotarella, and among the most important wine consultants in Italy and beyond. A “taste” was staged at “Milano Wine Week”, with the preview presentation of the teaser (with testimonials from, among others, Sting and Trudie Styler, Brunello Cucinelli, Bruno Vespa, Daniele Cernilli, Giacomo Neri, Piero Antinori, Leonardo Lo Cascio, Massimo D’Alema, as well as Jean Guillon from Bordeaux, Orhan Dragaš from Serbia, Christer Gardell from Mallorca, and Mounir Al-Rai from the Middle East) that recounts the professional journey of Riccardo Cotarella who, on the occasion of the Milan event that makes wine and its territories “parade on the catwalk”, received the “Lifetime Achievement Award - Italian Excellence”.
A teaser conceived and produced by an Italian-American team represented by Kimberly Olsen, executive producer; Frankie Nasso, director and producer; Alessandro Rossi, co-producer and head of interviewees; co-producers Willy Vecchiattini and Ugo De Fazio; as well as the entire production staff of Coupage Productions, the Miami-based American production company that has long been involved in the food and wine sector as well. So much so that an “episodic” story dedicated to the most important winemakers on the international scene could also materialize.
One focus is on the meaning of education for the younger generation. Riccardo Cotarella stressed that “wine speaks to us through its needs and by communicating whether the path needs attention, deviations, changes. It is an exchange, it is a unity of intent that the winemaker has with wine as one has with a person. Wine is a product that has to be known, you have to talk to it and listen to it to understand how it expresses itself. I do not want to exaggerate, but it is pure love”.
Coupage Productions executive director Kimberly Olsen revealed that “we have already interviewed important people and it is amazing to tell the biggest names from their earliest beginnings; we will continue to forge collaborations with the most established winemakers who have made history from their earliest beginnings to the ones who made them famous. Our wish, as Coupage Productions, would be to be able to involve all the greatest oenologists in the world of wine: we started in Italy, but we aim to reach everywhere. It has been a real honor to start with Riccardo Cotarella, a brilliant mind and a person of the highest human depth, and we are confident that we will be able to broaden our collaboration with the Cotarella family to get to tell the wonderful reality of the Intrecci school as well” (dedicated to the High Training of the wait staff, ed.).