Faith, Wine and a Centuries-Old Tradition: The Lord’s Vineyards Comes to NewCinema/Docs+

French filmmaker Renaud Fély explores one of France's lesser-known religious traditions in The Lord’s Vineyards, a 51-minute documentary coming to Whush as part of the NewCinema/Docs+ showcase.

Made in 2024, the film travels through some of the last monastic communities in France that continue to produce wine, examining a tradition that has survived since the Middle Ages. From Provence and the Montagne Sainte-Victoire to Languedoc and Burgundy, the documentary encounters monks and nuns for whom viticulture remains connected not only to work and economic survival, but also to faith.

At the centre of the film is a simple contrast: wine as a physical product of the land and wine as something sacred.

The Last Monastic Vineyards

The Lord’s Vineyards is guided by Jean-Robert Pitte, a geographer and specialist in French vineyards, as it visits religious communities that continue the centuries-old practice of producing wine within their monasteries.

The documentary focuses particularly on the daily lives and winemaking work of nuns, while also looking at the Eucharist and the symbolic role wine occupies within Christian worship.

For these communities, tending vines and producing wine have several functions. The vineyards provide economic resources that help maintain their abbeys, but the work is also connected to religious tradition and to the symbolic importance of wine within Christianity.

The filmmakers describe these surviving monastic vineyards as a remarkable historical continuity: practices originating in medieval Europe that remain part of everyday life in a small number of contemporary religious communities.

Between the Material and the Sacred

Rather than approaching wine primarily through gastronomy or the commercial wine industry, The Lord’s Vineyardsexamines its dual identity.

Growing grapes and producing wine require physical labour, knowledge of the land and practical winemaking skills. Within the monasteries visited in the documentary, however, wine also carries a spiritual significance through its association with Christ, communion and the Eucharist.

The film brings those two dimensions together, observing how religious life and agricultural work continue to coexist.

According to the filmmakers, this is the first documentary dedicated specifically to these surviving wine-producing monasteries and the historical continuity they represent.

An International Festival Journey

Since its completion, The Lord’s Vineyards has travelled to festivals in Europe, Asia, South America and the United States.

Its festival journey began with the Bangalore International Festival in India in June 2025, followed by screenings including the Cine Devocional International Festival in Buenos Aires, MOST Festival in Vilafranca del Penedès, Spain, and the Hallelujah Film Festival in Castel Gandolfo, Italy.

In France, the documentary received the “Vin sur Vin” Award at the Silence, ça touille festival in Locronan.

Further selections have included the Image Film & Food Festival in Sorrento and Lift-Off Film Festivals connected to Pinewood in the United Kingdom and New York.

Coming to NewCinema/Docs+

The Lord’s Vineyards will now reach audiences worldwide through NewCinema/Docs+ on Whush, continuing the international journey of a documentary devoted to a tradition that has survived for centuries but remains largely unknown outside the communities that practise it.

Through its encounters with monks and nuns, the film documents not simply how monastic wine is made, but why these communities continue to make it — preserving a relationship between agriculture, economic survival and religious faith that stretches back to the Middle Ages.

The Lord’s Vineyards (France, 2024), directed by Renaud Fély, runs 51 minutes in French with English, Italian and Spanish subtitles and will stream worldwide on Whush as part of the NewCinema/Docs+ showcase. https://www.whush.com/videos/the-lords-vineyards