The epic of the winegrowers or the fruit of perseverance told on France 3

Muscadet, Château Margaux, Saint-Émilion, Nuits-Saint-Georges, Chablis or champagne… So many big names in our wine heritage that delight the taste buds. In The Epic of the WinegrowersSeptember 7 on France 3Emmanuelle Nobecourt (Exodus, The Tree Genius) focuses on the realities of a profession in constant balance between the vagaries of nature and the law of the market. For a century and a half, it had to reinvent itself in a bold and courageous way. “This story comes to life thanks to the words of winegrowers of all generations. Their personal story, that of their family, allows us to enter in a sensitive and embodied way into the great story”, explains the director of this documentarywhich, somewhat like series A French town brings nuance to the complexity of an era.

The wine resists

Praised for its health benefits, then encouraged during the wars for its nutritional value and the courage it gave soldiers, wine, originally refined, became more democratic and flowed freely… to the point of causing certain abuses! In 1950, each Frenchman drank more than a liter of wine a day on average and the children consumed it in the canteen, reports The Epic of the Winegrowers on France 3.

We successively follow the history of the company at the time of phylloxera, fraudulent traders, the first cooperatives, the establishment of the wine code, the raid of the great wines by the Germans or the resistance in the heart of the cellars of Charles Heidsieck. As the Rothschilds are expropriated from their prestigious estates, Mouton Rothschild and Chateau LafiteMay-Éliane de Lencquesaing, who ran the wine estate of Pauillac Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande, remembers the arrival in the property of a Weinführer, very aware of the invaluable French capital.

Watch the videohttps://video.lefigaro.fr/figaro/video/vignes-des-ballons-contre-les-grelons/5792188429001/

The arrival of the tractor in the vineyards, pesticides, oenology and the more recent adventure of organic, has given wine worldwide prestige. Today, the Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée (AOC) protects the unique alliance between a place and a noble grape variety when already peasant winegrowers or large houses have to face new violent climatic challenges. Between the episodes of hail, the warming and the progress of the harvest, the winegrowers are again at a crossroads.