Movie Tasting: Pootie Tang (2001)
The Sa-Da-Tay of Early 2000's Cama-Day. An absurd wine blend for an absurdist movie.
We’re recording the first episode of the upcoming “Wine and…” podcast this weekend! And our guest - a filmmaker and podcaster par excellance - selected the PERFECT first subject for the pod:
Can’t wait to talk at length about this underrated cult gem and pair it with some wild wines.
Pootie Too Good
Pootie Tang is the sah-da-tay of early 2000's cama-day, blippity or wheesaw mae mae, it don't nah nay.
Leepa time, and Louis CK1 ain't cryin' to poostah or dilly-shane no shilly. Just cuz mistah wants to snickety snack his mangold near the ladies don't be making him no greasy Daddy-tay. Bang bang bang. Bang Bang. Bang.
Pootie.
Pootie, please.
Pootie, pleeeeeaaassse!
Don't leave this boy out on his lonesome. Licking milk out of a bowl.
Pootie too good. Pootie. Too. Good. POOTIE TOO GOOOOOOOOD! AAAAIIIEEEEE!!!!
Entertainment wow.
Paired with…
POOTIE TANG is an absurdist comedy, in line with other absurdist comedies of the 90’s and early 00’s that all bombed at the box office - rejected by critics and audiences alike - only to find cult status with younger generations further down the line, proving that they were quite literally “ahead of their time.”
Think CB4 (1993), CABIN BOY (1994) and FREDDY GOT FINGERED (2001). Like Pootie Tang’s Louis CK and Lance Crouther on Conan O’Brien, these all came from comedians that honed their absurdist routines on late night comedy shows. They weren’t just situational comedies or satires or parodies (though Pootie Tang is indeed, on one level, a parody of Blaxploitation films.) These are films that barely contain a plot, whose characteries are an assembly of absurd attributes but not actual chracters, but the comedy sketches throughout build upon each other, gaining in absurdity and outrageousness as they go.
With these comedies, you don’t really know why you’re laughing half the time, you just are. The jokes aren’t always apparent, the humor not always easy to pick apart. Like the abstract modern humor of Eric Andre today - Pootie Tang was a feature film length stab at capturing similar flavors back in 2001, when hardly any of us were asking for such a thing. But man does it sing in 2024.
I paired this with a rare blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Pinot Noir. A 50/50 blend of these two, in fact, something rarely seen in the wine world. The 2017 COWBOY SURFER from Bunter Spring Winery is no longer available, but I strongly recommend seeking out a similar absurd blend of structured and tannic Cabernet with the subtle and elegant cherry-and-earth notes of Pinot.
Winemaker’s Notes: “Our second iteration of this outrageous blend of normally antithetical varieties. The first Cowboy Surfer, 2014, was a resigned wishful last resort use for a barrel of weird Pinot. People loved it! When it was gone they asked for more. Not so easy, it turned out- there’s a reason why no one blends these two. The result almost always tastes like either a pathetically weak Cab or a nasty hot puckery Pinot. It took three years, but we finally made two wines that worked. FYI the Pinot, from close to the beach, is the surfer. The Cab, from cow country high up in the hills, is the cowboy. Black cherry, raspberry, spice, and tannin, just slightly on the aggro side right now, will mellow into a very laid-back ride. Ingredients: grapes, water, yeast, sulfite. Not fined or fitered. At bottling: total sulfite 65 ppm, residual sugar 0.1 g/l (very dry).” 49 cases.
There are some Cab/Pinot blends coming out of Tuscany, also Bulgaria and Hungary is you can track those down. It’s got depth and structure and a playfulness that difficult to pin down. Much like with absurd humor, you enjoy the sensations but can’t intellectually say why. When it works, it works gangbusters. It just rarely works.
Livestream this Thursday!
Join us as we chit chat with
of on his NSFW Comedy comic SMUT. Sexy comedy = what kind of wine now? Join us to find out!Since this review is cheeky nonsense, I want to post here in no uncertain terms that Louis CK has proven himself to be terrible, which is authentically a shame, as he was authentically talented. But this is as much Chris Rock's and Lance Crouther's movie as it is his, so I think we can still love this one for the unique and shockingly effective absurdity that it is. Tiddy chai, y’alls.
It’s definitely worth a long post! I had this conversation pre-#metoo about Woody Allen. It requires so much nuance too. Thx for writing so much back.
I totally get why you wanted to asterisk Louis CK, but one day in the near future I hope we can just assume that all artists are people. Humans do bad things and good things. Hopefully, we all do more good than bad and that asterisks are no longer necessary for some. I mean, I still love the song "Man in the Mirror" and yet I'm horrified by what I saw on HBO's "Leaving Neverland." I've never seen an asterisk by Michael Jackson's name. I think Louis CK did far less damage than MJ. Separately, I love reading your Substack and learning about wine, comics and culture! :-)