Ridley Scott | Screenlife Reviews

Giving Ridley Scott the keys to the Gucci story – a wild tale of family, betrayal and murder – should have made for one of the most arresting crime capers of the veteran director’s career. After all this is the man who gave us Gladiator, American Gangster and just this year The Last Duel. The result therefore is as baffling as it is frustrating; House of Gucci may just be Scott’s most bizarre film to date – a tonally jarring mishmash of humour and intense drama that does neither particularly successfully thanks to some truly horrendous performances and a painfully slow pace that somehow manages to also feel as if it is rushing through its dense narrative.

When working class Patrizia Reggiani (Lady Gaga) runs into heir to the Gucci fashion fortune Maurizio (Adam Driver), she senses that her fortunes are about to change, latching onto the man who is intent on becoming a lawyer and leaving his family’s business behind. When Maurizio introduces his new girlfriend to his hotheaded father Rodolfo (Jeremy Irons), he senses Patrizia’s less than honourable intentions, cutting his son off from the fortune and ceasing all contact as Maurizio assumes a less glamorous, but fulfilling life with his new bride.

But when Maurizio’s boisterous uncle Aldo (a fantastic Al Pacino) learns of his brother and nephew’s estrangement he makes it his mission to bring Maurizio and Patrizia back into the fold, offering him a lucrative job at Gucci and indoctrinating Patrizia into a life of luxury she could only have dreamt of. As Patrizia’s manipulation of Maurizio into taking the reigns of Gucci becomes more and more damaging to the rest of the family, including Aldo’s dimwitted son Paolo (Jared Leto), she is forced to consider desperate measures to stop the monster she helped create.

What immediately stands out about House of Gucci is the Italian accents. Everyone in the film attempts them, largely to godawful results outside of Al Pacino, and it is the first sign that something is not quite right. By and large it doesn’t stop the genuinely good performances of Adam Driver or Jeremy Irons from shining through but in Jared Leto’s case it turns what seems to be Scott making a serious attempt at telling this story in dramatic fashion into a farcical mess. Swathed in prosthetics and make-up, Leto completely loses himself in the character of Paolo. Unfortunately that character plays as more of a Mario Brother than a convincing human being, with Leto’s offensively stereotypical Italian accent taking the character to levels of parody the rest of the film is not prepared to follow. Every time his dimwitted, fat-suit laden character appears on-screen you can guarantee that the scene will devolve into unintentional hilarity, often at the expense of genuinely compelling dialogue or a pivotal beat, forgotten in the wake of Leto’s ridiculousness.

The film’s overall forgetfulness is also compounded by the strange pacing decisions Scott makes in his telling of Maurizio and Patrizia’s story. The introduction to these characters feels incredibly rushed, with them meeting and together within the opening fifteen minutes. We never get a reasonable amount of time to establish the characters or reason why we should care about them other than their functions within the story; Gaga as the manipulative temptress seeking status and Driver the unwitting cog in her plan, forced to betray his family for power and getting swept up in the allure of that power himself.

Once this dynamic is established Scott meanders through the inner workings of Patrizia’s long con, which mostly involves displays of exorbitant wealth and the obvious journey through Gucci’s fashionable history. Sure we get the impression that these characters are slowly transforming through their experiences, but once again Scott rushes the sudden switch Driver undergoes into monstrous business owner and Gaga’s sudden departure from that world, culminating in a finale that should be a lot more impactful than it is, with Scott keeping the audience at an arms length from his characters at all times; never allowing us to form any meaningful connection to them.

Much has been made of Gaga’s performance but she only narrowly escapes the same issues as Leto, her accent constantly wavering between an exaggerated Italian and Russian as she hams it up every chance she gets. Whenever a scene skews particularly dramatic or “awards-worthy” Gaga goes berserk, rarely giving anyone else in the scene a chance to go back and forth as she commands the room, regardless of the context of the conversation. It’s a distracting method of acting that undermines these important scenes, where Gaga could have benefitted from a “less is more” approach she almost always pivots the other way, regardless of how that affects the scene. For someone who schemed and plotted from the shadows as Patrizia Reggiano did, there never seems to be much quiet intensity in Gaga’s performance, replaced by a need to shine and exaggerate even the most imperceptible traits.

House of Gucci is a strange anomaly in Ridley Scott’s filmography; a concept that on paper looks suited to his particular talent for complex, intense storytelling but which in practicality devolves into a messy, haphazardly paced jumble of poor accents and jarring tonal shifts. It almost feels like Scott on autopilot; a perfunctory telling of a story that could have been a gripping, steadily intensifying examination of a family on the way to a breakdown. Instead we’re left with a film that will at best gain a cult following for Jared Leto’s hilariously bad performance and at worst fade from collective consciousness.

House of Gucci stars Lady Gaga, Adam Driver, Al Pacino, Jeremy Irons, Jared Leto, Jack Huston & Salma Hayek – In cinemas now.

4/10

It’s been 24 years since Matt Damon and Ben Affleck last wrote together, with their efforts resulting in an Oscar win for the classic that is Good Will Hunting. Since that time the pair have gone on to find individual success in everything from acting in big budget blockbusters to directing academy award winning films. Their return to writing (alongside Nicole Holofcener) then, comes with big expectations – a medieval #metoo story doesn’t sound like an easy premise to crack – and who better to call upon to direct than Ridley Scott. The Last Duel might not be as impactful as Good Will Hunting – bloated at times with some questionable accents and prosthetics – but it is still an incredibly enthralling tale of a woman who struggled against an oppressive system in order to tell her truth; a premise which sadly still resonates today.

Told in three parts, each representing one of the central trio’s “truths”, the main conflict revolves around French knights Jean de Carrouges (Damon) and Jacques Le Gris (Adam Driver), friends through military service who grow distant upon their return from war. Carrouges’ temper has long held him in bad esteem with his overlord Count Pierre d’Alençon (Affleck) – cousin of King Charles VI (Alex Lawther) – who finds his behaviour ill befitting of the courts, seizing land and preventing Carrouges from assuming an entitled captaincy to spite him. Le Gris, on the other hand, found favour with the Count through his financial skills and diplomacy, landing him a prized position of counsel as well as all the knightly benefits denied to Carrouges.

When Le Gris forces himself on Carrouges’ wife Marguerite (Jodie Comer), violently raping her, she appeals to her husband to substantiate her claim in the courts; an embarrassing and shameful ordeal that ultimately results in the two men duelling to the death to determine the truth; conveniently ignorant to the fact that Marguerite will suffer more than either man should her husband fail to defeat his foe.

As a film about perspective, The Last Duel is largely successful. The overlap between the three individual’s stories means that the film spends a lot of its runtime revisiting moments, usually in order to present a new insight or – in some cases – an entirely new interpretation of a conversation or event. Through this, Scott is able to dig deep into the lies men tell themselves in order to retain their honour; regardless of the people it may hurt. The objectification of Marguerite by Le Gris and Carrouges draws obvious parallels with the recent #metoo movement within Hollywood, with the road to telling her truth paved with hardship and embarrassment. It isn’t the most deep examination, particularly given the largely male creative team behind the production, but it is effective in drawing outraged gasps and knowing groans at the injustices Marguerite suffers.

Where that repetition becomes tiresome is in the scenes that are replayed entirely to remind audiences that they occurred, without adding any new dimensions to the event or characters within. It doesn’t happen so much that you feel like you are watching the film in triplicate but it is enough to make the already gargantuanly long film feel bloated. That problem is somewhat compounded when you consider the film’s intent to give voice to the woman at the centre of this male conflict, yet we spend the vast majority of proceedings focused on these two men and their proverbial pissing contest. A well made depiction of the injustices women suffered at the time, no doubt, but one that offers little commentary on the strides made since or the sad lack thereof.

Key to the film not succumbing to the repetition is the casting, with stellar performances across the board keeping you engaged, particularly Driver and Comer. Driver is equal parts gentleman and sleaze bag as the cocksure Le Gris, who has bought into the status associated with his position to the point where you start to question whether he genuinely believes the lies he spews out to defend himself from Marguerite’s accusations. It’s is a performance that can turn on a dime from disarmingly charming to scum of the earth at the drop of a hat, further proving Driver as one of the finest, most under-appreciated actors of his generation.

Comer continues her rise following a completely different role in this year’s Free Guy with a quiet, measured and emotionally devastating performance as Marguerite. Largely silent in the presence of her husband or other men, majority of the character building during these scenes comes from facial expressions and small glances. When the time comes for Marguerite’s truth to be told, Comer capitalises on all of that pent up emotion, with a fiery performance that should land her in this year’s Oscar race.

Speaking of awards, The Last Duel absolutely deserves to be in the conversation for sound editing and mixing, with the terrifyingly loud clangs of swords against armour and squelches of flesh rending under sword sticking with you long after the scene has ended. The film isn’t particularly action-heavy until the titular duel, but the flashes of battles that are shown are brutally effective in their brevity, full of frenetic flashes of gore and quick cuts that disorientate the viewer in the same way as the combatants. Costuming is another area that shines with elaborate dresses and armour showing meticulous care and craftsmanship, but the less said about Damon and Affleck’s hair pieces and prosthetics, the better.

The Last Duel might not have the lasting legacy of Good Will Hunting but it is nonetheless an impressive sophomore effort from Damon and Affleck that effectively captures the brutality of medieval France, both on and off the battlefield. Bloated at times but more often deeply enthralling thanks to the efforts of a star studded cast and immersive costuming and sound design, Ridley Scott’s latest might not hit the level of commentary it aims for, but it still manages to leave you thinking even if it doesn’t offer much in the way of solutions going forward. Marguerite’s struggle might have resulted in the last duel at the time, but the problems she brought to light are far from over.

The Last Duel stars Matt Damon, Adam Driver, Jodie Comer, Ben Affleck, Harriet Walter, Nathaniel Parker, Alex Lawther & Martin Csokas – In cinemas now.

4/10

7/10