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Brunello Cucinelli can now add ‘actor’ to his already encyclopedic résumé. The philosopher-entrepreneur of cashmere has stepped in front of the camera to play the most challenging role of all—himself—in Brunello, The Gracious Visionary, a docu-film tracing the arc of his life and ideals. With Giuseppe Tornatore—the Oscar-winning director of Cinema Paradiso (1990)—at the helm, the film offers a romantic portrait of Cucinelli’s singular brand of craftsmanship and philosophy, rendered with a hint of silver screen nostalgia.
“I agreed to make this film because I’ve reached that age when one begins to contemplate the ‘afterlife,’ so to speak,” Cucinelli remarked matter-of-factly. “I’d rather not leave it to someone else to tell my story once I’m gone—this way I won’t be turning in my grave over how badly they told it.” Tornatore returned the compliment, praising Cucinelli’s aplomb: “He never interfered or tried to steer the narrative. He didn’t even ask to see any footage, and only watched the film once it was finished,” the director said. “Honestly, he was so discreet, it was as if he were already dead.”
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A dream-big undertaking, Brunello, The Gracious Visionary charts the rise of a self-styled humanist who maintains that cashmere and conscience can, in fact, share the same wardrobe. Blending documentary with fiction—a young Cucinelli is portrayed by Italian actor Saul Nanni—it revisits the pivotal moments that shaped him, from his modest rural childhood to Solomeo, the Umbrian village that he has famously refashioned into a showpiece of “capitalism with a soul.”
Through testimonies and archival snippets—from footage of his unemployed youth, which featured Kawasaki motorbikes, card-sharking, and a stint as Jesus in a village Easter pageant—to family memories and actual videotaped scenes of him as a teenager cross-dressing and dancing in the local bar, the film sketches a portrait of a man who built a global brand without relinquishing ideals of dignity and social justice. He still remains convinced that “with enough courage, dreams are the true engine of destiny.”
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The narrative also brushes against a broader social backdrop: post–World War II Italy, where rural life was hollowed out by industrialization and city-bound aspirations. “I missed the countryside’s silence, its slow rhythm, and watching the stars instead of the television,” he reflected. Even today, he prefers the crackle of a fireplace and losing himself in its flames to watching an after-dinner football match on TV. All his major decisions, he said, are made “in solitude, pacing around my studio and ruminating,” under the watchful gaze of his personal philosophical pantheon: Plato, Aristotle, Pericles, and company, all silently nodding along.
Tornatore, who turned to Oscar-winning composer Nicola Piovani for the film’s soulful score, was initially hesitant to take on the project, unfamiliar as he was with Cucinelli’s place in the fashion world. But after meeting the designer in person, he relented. “Brunello always gets what he wants,” chimed his wife Federica, clearly well-versed in her husband’s ways. “The movie is neither straight documentary, nor traditional feature film, nor corporate calling card, but something mischievously suspended among all three,” Tornatore explained. “Its aim is to explore Brunello’s life through a playful tug-of-war between forms: on one side, the familiar rigor of documentary; on the other, the staged narrative of a film that may, or may not, actually exist. The two threads overlap, blur, and ultimately fuse into a free-spirited cinematic experiment.”
Produced by Brunello Cucinelli S.p.A. and MasiFilm in collaboration with Rai Cinema, Brunello, The Gracious Visionary premiered in Rome on December 4, 2025. It will land in Italian cinemas on December 9 via 01 Distribution. The venue was Studio 22 at Cinecittà, where Fellini worked his magic and where Tornatore cut his cinematic teeth. The premiere drew a slew of Italian dignitaries and a sprinkling of Hollywood stars, including Jessica Chastain, Jeff Goldblum, Jonathan Bailey, Ava DuVernay, and Chris Pine, among others.
After the screening, about a thousand guests meandered through a candlelit Cinecittà set replicating an Imperial Roman forum, classical music wafting through the air, until they arrived in a life-size replica of Cucinelli’s legendary library of 10,000 volumes. Amid statues of Venus and other Greek deities, dinner was served: paccheri al sugo, Brunello’s favorite pasta, was cooked live perfectly al dente in giant pans by chefs dressed head-to-toe in Cucinelli. Brunello, dapper in a gray tuxedo with silver-satin lapels, ruled the evening like a benevolent pope (“Honestly, I’d love being a Pope!”), holding court well past midnight, proving that from philosophy to movies to pasta, he really does it all.
