>> Today, Valentino: The Last Emperor, Matt Tyrnauer's fly-on-the-wall documentary that follows the designer from June 2005 to June 2007, debuted at the Venice Film Festival. Valentino favorite Natalia Vodianova was in attendance, and Valentino successor Alessandra Facchinetti even showed up for support.
The designer says that during filming, he didn't try to hide anything from the cameras, even when he got into a disagreement with his longtime business partner Giancarlo Giammetti:
When I work and I create, I am not very approachable. To . . . know everything I say was being recorded did irritate me. There were moments of anger, when somebody says something that I don't like, but I was completely myself from the beginning to the end and nothing was edited.
Director Tyrnauer praised Valentino for his willingness to be "wired" for two years and allowing himself to be depicted on film "warts and all," adding that there were very few times when he asked that the cameras be turned off: "They only screamed at us occasionally and we put most of it in the film."
One such moment? When Valentino, exasperated by the chaos backstage at one of his shows, proclaims, "People must learn that they have to follow me. They must be down on their knees in front of me!"
Valentino had no editorial control over the film, and apparently isn't always portrayed in the best of lights, but Karl Lagerfeld seems to think the world of his fellow designer: “Compared to you, darling,” he says in the film, “the rest of us are making rags.”
*image: source
>> INSIDER WIRE —Valentino may have relieved himself of the accelerating fashion schedule, but another equally vexing burden might have taken its place. Although a Valentino spokesperson wouldn't confirm — they don't comment on the designer's personal affairs — it appears that Valentino may be a victim of the Bernie Madoff scandal. Sources "from the fashion world" say that he was defrauded of "a significant amount of cash." [Evening Standard] 
