Director: Matt Tyrnauer
Producer: Matt Kapp
Starring: Valentino Garavani, Giancarlo Giammetti
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Running time: 96 min.

(4/5)

Growing up, fashion was always an art form. In part it was my mother’s love for all things beautiful and the fact that we simply could never afford the latest to come off the French or Italian runways. That didn’t stop us from growing up surrounded by beautiful fabrics, a mother who constantly designed and sewed her own clothes and who often referred to the latest fashion magazines for inspiration.

Shortly after a move to Canada and a job which sucked up all her free time, clothing became more of a necessity than something to enjoy and though I didn’t see another roll of fabric in the house, we still took in a weekly dose of Jeanne Beker and Fashion Television. Ferragamo, Gaultier, Gucci, Chanel, Galliano, YSL. All masters of their trade. Individuals who create art from fabric. I l have always loved to take in the lines, the colours, the movement; to look at couture lines over the years and see not only the changing times but also the growing and changing of artists is nothing short of bliss.

Long revered as one of the masters, Valentino was never my favourite though over the last few years I’ve come to love his long, classic flowing style. Not one I often saw interviewed, I knew very little about the designer and when the opportunity presented itself to catch up with Valentino: The Last Emperor, I seized it.

Matt Tyrnauer’s documentary is not concerned with Valentino’s early life, where he came from or how he came into design. Instead, it focuses on the last two years of Valentino’s professional career. How it came into fruition is not clear but there are moments in the film where one gets the sense that this documentary was a project hatched within the Valentino empire as a way to celebrate the designer’s 45 years in fashion. The resulting film is an interesting mix of the business of Valentino SpA, Valentino the man and Valentino and Giancarlo Giammetti the partners.

Thankfully, it’s not all glitz and glamour, pretty faces and happy moments. The documentary never paints Valentino as an always amicable, infallible character and instead we get to see the creative force as a real human being; a man who lives and works in a world of opulence and beauty. He has tantrums, he has fallbacks, he can be difficult to work with and at the end of it all, there’s a sense that he’s simply a man surrounded by eccentricities.

Though the look at Valentino is interesting, what is most impressive about the documentary is the behind the scenes look at the creative process and the business of the fashion industry. The viewer is granted access into Valentino’s inner sanctum where we don’t simply hear the designer speak of inspiration but we see the final product of that inspiration from the sketch, to the seamstresses at work to the runway. Along the way, we’re also privy to the inside track of the business; the push and change of the industry from clothes to accessories and the immense amount of work that goes into the theatrics of the runway show.

Valentino: The Last Emperor is not a rags to riches story of a boy with a dream but it is a celebration of a life’s work and the exuberant man behind a household name. Those even mildly interested in the fashion industry are sure to enjoy the film and while it may not instantly appeal to the fashion un-inclined, it does provide an interesting, if limited, introduction to an icon of an often misunderstood industry.