Rainier: A Beer Odyssey (2024)

Rainier: A Beer Odyssey

I’d like to start this reaction review by saying that the coffee is my primary caffeine delivery system for survival through film festivals, and various types of water preferably filtered and carbonated but definitely unsweetened. If I had to pick a drink, beer would be the last thing on my mind. However, I am thrilled that RAINIER: A BEER ODYSSEY is premiering at Seattle International Film Festival today and will likely be one of the toughest screenings to get into; both showings are already nearly sold out at the SIFF Cinema Egyptian. This movie IS Seattle in so many ways, and also so much more but you’ll see what I mean. Read my reaction below the official synopsis!

Festival Notes: Few words are as overused as “iconic,” but Rainier Beer’s red-script “R” logo is just that for decades a symbol of Seattle second only, perhaps, to the Space Needle itself. Rainier: A Beer Odyssey examines in exhaustive detail how that came to be. (Long story short: It was the dozens of wisecracking, nutty TV ads from Terry Heckler and Gordon Bowker’s troupe of endlessly inventive [m]ad men and women, which have never left anyone’s memory who lived here from the Worlds Fair through Reagan; some of these merry pranksters were alums of Seattle magazine, and that chapter of local journalism history gets an affectionate sidebar).

Parody was a favorite strategy using celeb impersonators from Carson to Rambo; sending up films from Jaws to Amadeus; lotsa time-capsule pop songs Mickey Rooney got a late career boost when they discovered by accident he was available plus plenty o’ beer jokes themselves (“It’s not just any Schlitz!”). Then in 1987 Aussie Alan Bond (the Rupert Murdoch of brewing) bought Rainier & instantly fired Heckler Bowker (wha’ hoppened to the Australian? Stay tuned), after which sales of Ranier dropped faster than you could say, well, that. Because the ad crew was so young, several are still around eager talking heads for director Isaac Olsen amid the wealth of vintage old Seattle clips he’s amassed.

You may think you wouldn’t need to watch a documentary about the infamous advertising campaign of a centuries-old beer company that put Seattle on the map for a small group of creatives, but you do. After watching this incredibly entertaining doc I can honestly say that never in my wildest dreams would I have thought that I would be sitting through an incredibly fascinating documentary like RAINIER: A BEER ODYSSEY that absolutely floored me for its entire running time, and it’s also a great underdog story because it is about a brilliant ad agency that made some of the most memorable ads ever created for any little beer company which is still around today.

RAINIER: A BEER ODYSSEY deserves its name, and more. It is not only a tribute to beer but also a love letter to Seattle and its culture through unique advertising. I grew up with Rainier beer ads (even in Victoria, BC, Canada where we picked up the Seattle TV stations and watched avidly) and toured the brewery with my late, great dad in the late 1990s so even though I didn’t drink beer at that age it was still weird enough for me about Rainier and that motorcycle going into the mountains along with the life-sized beer bottles and many other memorable ads. And now here we are decades later with this full-on love letter.

Filmmaker Isaac Olsen moves all this around at such a fun, almost deranged pace where he just wants to make you happy. You can tell that Olsen along with his entire team of creatives adore this era so much and take care in presenting this story to get you invested in this era. My smile could not have been wiped from my face as I was given not only a full showing of vintage footage, burned up film clips but also exact right interviews of everyone down to the famous-to-me John Keister who always made me tune into ALMOST LIVE when I was a kid growing up watching TV based out of Seattle.

Having doc energy on Edgar Wright’s THE SPARKS BROTHERS level, I wasn’t prepared for being thrown head first into a history of Seattle from the late 60s until today starting off with Seattle Magazine; some local coffee chain that took off; many more local icons that made the city what it is; ending with footage of locals still remembering Rainier after all these decades dovetailing into Rainier’s infamous beer industry where did it go in the 80s after being bought by a corporation (there’s a sequence involving a POV near flying camera shot of the brewery that left me speechless) and the ad company went away, it’s actually sad when you think about it. The doc even goes Kubrick mode at times with some 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY parodies that even topped the opening scene to BARBIE last year, earning its awesome title.

RAINIER: A BEER ODYSSEY is not only one of the best movies at SIFF this year but one of the best documentaries I’ve seen in 2024. Just seeing this doc made my first Seattle International Film Festival worth the work, travel and experience as I HUNGER for documentary experiences like this ones that I fully intend to nudge down the road and celebrate. Don’t miss it. And I don’t even drink beer!

Watch Rainier: A Beer Odyssey For Free On Gomovies.