(Matt Tyrnauer, US 2009, 96 min. English/Italian/French/subtitles)

Longtime Vanity Fair editor-writer Matt Tyrnauer takes on haute couture icon Valentino, a man whose fabulous gowns have graced the bodies of the world’s most glamorous women for nearly five decades. The film was shot over two years—in Paris, Rome, London, NYC, Gstaad, and aboard Valentino’s yacht—during a period when retirement rumors were swirling about the designer and his business/life partner, Giancarlo Giammetti. The filmmaker had extraordinary access to both men, whose arguments over the need for more ruffles or the appropriateness of sand dunes for a runway show are inevitably reduced to the intimacy and warmth that are the bedrock of their relationship.