Valentino film reveals the ‘Sun Bed King’ at his bitchy best

A film about the flamboyant Italian fashion designer Valentino (pictured with Eva Herzigova) is proving a hit at this year's Venice film festival. The movie, aptly entitled Valentino: The Last Emperor, is ostensibly a chronicle of the 'last great couturier's' 50 years in the rag trade, but what has excited critics are the scenes that feature his business partner for all those years, Giancarlo Giammetti.

In one scene, Valentino tells the long-suffering Giammetti, without any apparent irony, "People have to be on their knees in front of me". Wendy Ide, of the Times, sees this as a pivotal moment. She writes: "It is around this point … you realise that Valentino and Giametti really have forgotten that the camera is trained upon their every niggling sideswipe, the point where a reverential documentary about the creator of some meltingly lovely frocks kicks up a notch and turns into great entertainment."

Adds Ide: "He [Valentino] has the weathered face of a Galapagos tortoise – an effusive Italian journalist compares him to the Sun King, but you can’t help thinking that the Sun Bed King might be more appropriate." (Continued below)

The film is cleverly directed by Matt Tyrnauer, special correspondent for Vanity Fair magazine, who appears to have been given an unlimited level of access. At one point Valentino declares that "an evening dress that reveals a woman’s ankles while walking is the most disgusting thing I have ever seen". And from the look on his face, he really means it.