[Review] House Of Gucci (8/10)

 

Title - House Of Gucci
Production - BRON Studios, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Scott Free Productions
Starring - Lady Gaga, Adam Driver, Al Pacino, Jeremy Irons, Jared Leto, Jack Huston, Selma Hayek, Gaetano Bruno, Camille Cottin, Yousseff Kerkour, Reeve Carney
Writer - Becky Johnston, Roberto Bentivegna
Director - Ridley Scott
Release - 24 November 2021

With the Oscar nominations just announced, and after watching House Of Gucci, I am truly surprised that Lady Gaga was not nominated. Even though I haven't seen nominated roles by Nicole Kidman and Penelope Cruz, I thought Gaga's performance was undeniable and a few steps up from her previous role in a star is born. 

With the right director and a role that she is interested in, I think she could be not just a competent actor every time, but a great one.

This whole movie in the first two acts, half of it centered around her performance and who her character was. Doesn't matter who the real Patrizia was, in this version, she was the driving force of this story and manipulated her way into the Gucci family business. 

Adam Driver was the other half and also what a great performance he had here. 

But, like The Last Duel, Ridley Scott's direction chose to omit certain events to the audience. While it still made sense by the time we come to the end of the movie (more so than The Last Duel), I still would have liked to see how certain plot points happened.

One such was how Driver's character suddenly went from someone who was more timid into the ruthless side during the third act. Don't get me wrong though, seeing Driver suddenly changed was a highlight for the movie, too. 

I remember I had gasps and other verbal reactions as the third act unfolded. There were a lot of great scenes and great performances, too; particularly Al Pacino's at the boardroom scene - which I thought he should have been nominated for a Best Supporting Oscar rather than, say, Kodi Smit-McPhee.

When compared to The Last Duel, House Of Gucci was a much more enjoyable movie - and Scott's complaints of how the former didn't do well theatrically was completely unfounded.