Crossword Genius

Beastly kind of wine the French knocked over (6)

Ross

I believe the answer is:

brutal

I'm a little stuck... Click here to teach me more about this clue!

'beastly' is the definition.
(I know that beastly can be written as brutal)

'kind of wine the french knocked over' is the wordplay.
'kind of wine' becomes 'brut' (I can't explain this - if you can you should give a lot more credence to this answer).
'the french' becomes 'la' ('the' in French).
'knocked over' shows that the letters should be reversed in order.
'la' backwards is 'al'.
'brut'+'al'='BRUTAL'

Can you help me to learn more?

(Other definitions for brutal that I've seen before include "Disposed to inflict pain" , "Very cruel and beastly" , "Rottweiler" , "Cruel, inhuman" , "Cruel and unfeeling like an animal" .)

I've seen this clue in The Independent.
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