The priceless opportunity to crash an artist's inner sanctum and watch him at work is the considerable appeal of this documentary, whose name it appropriates, of course, from the Bernardo Bertolucci-directed Academy Award-winning film about the end of the Qing Empire in feudal China. "Valentino: The Last Emperor" allows the viewer a peak into the rarefied world of "haute coutre", where the fashion designer's latest crisis, sequins or no sequins for his latest creation, is in the process of being resolved. In a crowded room, surrounded by his minions, a typically angular model is reduced to a mannequin; her casual nudity no more titillating than a venerable nun's state of undress. The subject of the scene is that white gown, not the woman who occupies it. As she's being fitted, the model's downturned countenance of ennui de-eroticizes her nakedness. The room full of people, all tending to their appointed tasks, pay no mind to this woman in the buff, which orientates the viewer to see the model through Valentino's eyes. Perhaps a nipple ring would have destroyed the functional aspect of the model's bared breasts, but the prevailing context of her nudity blurs the male gaze, since the viewer has no corresponding stand-in within the diegesis to enjoy the female form in all its purity. The opportunities to see a naked woman of film are endless. The quotidian visage of the model deflects attention away from her; she's not in the seducing mood; she's working, and onto her clothes. To Valentino's credit, the white gown that forms around the model's diaphanous body makes her look even more desirable than the pure state she achieves through the rigorous denial of normal caloric sustenance. The nude dress upstages the nude woman. The dress does the seducing. The viewer wants that dress; the dress is the eye candy, in this instance. Finally, the emperor decrees: Let there be sequins. And we were there to see an icon put the finishing touches on his latest masterpiece. Alas, "Valentino: The Last Emperor" will irk those who can't relate, or pretend to sympathize with the problems of the rich. But wealth is beside the point in Valentino's case. Stripped of its luxurious trappings, the fashion designer's trials and tribulations should be remarkably relatable to anybody who ever created a work of art, and saw their creative control suddenly taken away from them.
