24
Nov
2021
House of Gucci

House of Gucci

In 1978, Patrizia Reggiani as played by Lady Gaga is an Italian woman with real ambition in her eyes. When she bumps into the Italian royalty that is Adam Driver’s Maurizio Gucci, she adamantly won’t let go. Finally charming him into love, Maurizio subsequently introduces her to his father Rodolfo as played by Jeremy Irons. However, Rodolfo is not so smitten by Patrizia’s energy. Sensing that she is only interested in Maurizio’s money, Rodolfo threatens to cut him out of the family. Yet, Maurizio still marries Patrizia and in doing so discovers that the simple life and working for his father-in-law’s trucking firm really does suit him.

And the story should really stop there with everyone being happy, but no. -Why? Because in the eyes of the ambitious Patrizia, where there’s a pregnancy, there’s always a way…

… you’ll safely be able to refer to the House of Gucci as the House of Gaga come Oscar time.

So, coming off the heels of 2017’s All The Money In The World, House of Gucci once again finds director Ridley Scott charting the murky histories of the rich and famous. Based upon Sara Gay Forden’s book The House of Gucci: A Sensational Story of Murder, Madness, Glamour, and Greed Scott’s latest certainly does contain all of the above ingredients. Lady Gaga kills it with an accent that can smash crockery, Adam Driver looks like an over-looked, dapper mouse and Jeremy Irons scythes into both of their plans with a single syllable. -What is there not to love here?

Well, in sporting a briskness of pace that was sadly missing from The Last Duel, there is one divisive piece of chalk to be found in all this lavish cheese – and that’s Jared Leto’s performance as Paolo Gucci.

Flustering around inside a fat suit as an unwanted son of the family, Leto’s Paulo either brings much-needed levity to the proceedings or veritable death by ice cream. Eye-rolling at every available ceiling, whilst channelling the vocal intonations of 1980s popster Joe Dolce, you might want to shaddy-up-his face after a while. Fortunately, though he is not alone. Stood beside all of his histrionics is the implacable Al Pacino as his father Aldo Gucci, who is brother to Jeremy Iron’s Rodolfo. All munificent charm and salesman’s patter, Pacino is the qualitative core of both the business and the movie. As a clear target for Gaga’s scheming Patrizia to aim at, it’s Aldo’s gullibility that fatefully unlocks the final chapter of the movie.

So, simply put, if you can weather Leto’s tossed teacups and surrender yourself to the wholesale campness of a soufflé done right, then Ridley Scott’s latest movie truly does have something to offer you. As a further confirmation of a star being born, let’s just say that you’ll safely be able to refer to the House of Gucci as the House of Gaga come Oscar time.

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