By Aryan Aggarwal
Ridley Scott’s House of Gucci resembles the classic 80s crime drama genre: the perfect blend of money, power, grand locations, family disputes, a fiery yet short-lived love story, and most importantly, Italian accents! Director Ridley Scott manages to pull off everything moderately well. The acting of Lady Gaga and Adam Driver is impeccable, and the movie does well to lay out the dynamics of a reluctant yet bright young heir to the throne and a twisted family (essentially feeling like a regurgitation of the plot of The Godfather).
The movie begins with a focus on the love story between Maurizio Gucci (played by Adam Driver) and social climber Patrizia Reggiani (Lady Gaga). The transition from love story to family drama with the introduction of the hilarious Jared Leto as Maurizio’s idiot cousin Paulo (the best and worst thing in the film) and Al Pacino as the withering old Alto Gucci is subtle and well executed.
The trouble arises around the middle of the film. House of Gucci essentially tries to play homage to two genres at once and consequently fails miserably. The classic crime-drama – where we witness our protagonist struggle and rise through a deadly minefield of family and business politics often to their own demise – and the classic destructive love-story – how greed corrupts the intimacy that brought the two people together in the first place. Adam Driver and Lady Gaga snatch at each other like pariahs without any build-up and the “Gucci Empire”, a now-decaying business, is assumed without any proper explanation. The dialogue and overarching conflict feel inauthentic as the movie tries to rush towards the end. The result is unfortunately resoundingly anti-climactic.
What the movie lacked was depth of the source material itself. Based on the true story of the assassination of Maurizio Gucci, there simply aren’t enough characters or family history to replicate the high-stakes, shakesperian heights of betrayal and subterfuge seen in recent family soap operatics such as Knives Out. Neither is there enough depth to the love story beyond Patrizia’s narcissicism and a more-than-awkward sex scene to attemptedly portray how two ‘crazy in love’ individuals eventually grow apart. It is surprising that for a movie with a runtime of two hours and thirty-eight minutes, the biggest problem is the fast pacing of the plot and its rushed exposition. Where numerous movies in the past have successfully portrayed intricate family dramas or disastrous and tragic love stories, Ridley Scott manages to do neither.
Despite some nice touches with the soundtrack which added some comic levity, the film ends up being bland. Gaudy and glamorous as the film may be, it’s certainly not memorable.
