Bordeaux 2007
A film is to be made of Robert Parker’s life, we are told, or at least so Decanter’s April Fool story, released during the primeurs in the spring of 2008, would have us believe. And with two films of that famous 1976 Judgement of Paris tasting either underway or completed at the time of writing, it seems that Hollywood and Bordeaux might make good bedfellows. Budding script writers, eager to get in on the act, might find that the 2007 Bordeaux vintage has the right ingredients for a similarly good story; prolonged desperation through a chilly summer with no apparent hope of reprieve until almost the last minute, a miraculous change of fortunes when all looked lost, and it all – well, almost all – turns out alright at the end. Yes, 2007 might well be called the Hollywood vintage; a typical tale of woe, with an improbable ending.
The Hollywood Vintage
The story begins with budbreak and flowering. Please don’t switch off, for once this is not an academic inspection of the life cycle of the vine. In 2007 these processes were absolutely central to both the problems and the eventual salvation of the vintage; problematic, because it was so irregular, but a saving grace in that it was remarkably early, with many of the warmer terroirs showing budbreak in March. Early flowering is not without risk, as a cold snap could easily devastate the process, and thus drastically reduce the volume of the harvest. And when frost comes in Bordeaux, it can strike mercilessly, as was seen in 1956, when it wiped out more than just flowers and fruit, many vines died too. Sixty years on there is less worry about frost, but nevertheless there were some cold nights in late March, never quite reaching 0ºC, but certainly cold enough to dissuade the vines from their early awakening. And thus although early, budbreak was a patchy and prolonged affair. This set the scene, consequently, for an irregular and prolonged flowering, and then later in the year an erratic veraison – when the fruit changes colour as it ripens.
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