Beer Wars Follow Up Thread

[Shawn, the Beer Philosopher]

Post your post Beer Wars thoughts here. Did you enjoy the film? Learn anything?

How about the live segments ... good? No good?

[Ken Howes]

Haven't seen it; I don't think it played around Chicago.

[Grant]

Well,It played here in Bakersfield.BUt,honestly,I spaced it.And,since its a one day only event,I imagine I am foiled.But

[The Beer Babe]

My take : http://www.beer-babe.com/2009/04/make-beer-not-war.html

I think we're misdirecting our anger...

[Scott E. Kingsbury]

Hi, B.B. You said: "Additionally troubling to me was the lack of acknowledgement of the craft beer drinking community. Absent were bloggers, writers, critics, and authors..."

Amen, Sister!! Personally, I felt that the quick brush-off of Todd Alström during the panel-discussion was disheartening. As I wrote in another place...something you could only see at the in-person UCLA event, was the off-camera director giving Ben Stein the "speed-it-up" hand-signals...and, by the time Mr. Stein got around to asking Todd a question, (after the film-clip which made everybody in the room wince) - it was time to talk to Anat and wrap up.

[Matt Becker]

Here's my quick take, reposted from another site:

I was fortunate enough to have access to the VIP afterparty (Thanks BeerTapTV.com!), and I gotta say, these guys (Todd Alstrom, Sam Calagione, Charlie Papazian, Greg Koch) are all as cool as they seem (I seriously regressed into 13-year-old fanboy mode when meeting these guys.)

As far as the movie goes, I think it was mostly preaching to the choir. This was 95% information that any serious beer enthusiast would already know. Unfortunately, due to the hype and price, I imagine there were very few people watching who weren't beer geeks. Dissappointment, imo, was inevitable.

I also agree that the Moonshot focus was very out of place, and skewed the focus of the whole film. Considering that it's a commodity beverage, and not a craft beer, it changed the message of the film from "artisinal brewers who care about the taste of their beer more than profits vs BMC brewers whose product is a commodity to make profits more than a work of passion" into "big guys making lots of money vs small guys struggling to make more money." The movie was far, far more focused on the business aspect of the industry than the beer itself - which seems to me to be the antithesis of what craft beer is really all about.

[Jinja]

Meh.

[BeerExpedition]

I enjoyed the film it maid me thirsty though, I wish they would have taken questions from the audience afterword.

[Beerbuddha]

The movie was ok. The beer we smuggled in made it so much better though. The whole Moonshot 69 segment really pissed me off though. I later found out Rhonda's company has been around since 2001 and she has other beers in her portfolio. Apparently she started New Century Brewing with Dr. Joseph Owades the inventor light beer and together they made Edison which is some craft light beer or something. Why wasn't this touched on at all? There are plenty of small craft breweries out there struggling that they could have focused on instead of her. Other than that the movie was good to watch. I was surprised about the "lawsuit" against DFH because of the name Punkin and Chickory. Are you kidding me??? I would love to know what becomes of that.

[KegGremlin]

I have not seen Beer Wars yet, but I would like to point out another beer documentary which I love. Anyone who wants to watch a fun documentary about the love of beer, and watch 5 friends on a cross country trip to visit 38 breweries in 40 days, should watch "American Beer: A Bockumentary". Not to be confused with the movie of the same title. It's not very controversial, but it is very amusing, and makes you want to drink a good beer while you watch.

http://www.amazon.com/American-Beer-Special-Paul-Kermizian/dp/B000N...