LOVE, CECIL
Director: Lisa Immordino Vreeland Run Time: 99 min. Format: DCP Rating: NR Release Year: 2018
Starring: David Bailey, Manolo Blahnik, Hamish Bowles, Susanna Brown, Leslie Caron, Peter Eyre. Narrated by Rupert Everett.
Oscar-winning set and costume designer, photographer, writer and painter Cecil Beaton was not only a dazzling chronicler, but an arbiter of his time. From the Bright Young Things to the front lines of war to the international belle monde and the pages of Vogue and then onto the Queen’s official photographer – Beaton embodied the cultural and political changes of the twentieth century.
In this tender portrait, director Lisa Immordino Vreeland (Diana Vreeland: The Eye Has To Travel, Peggy Guggenheim: Art Addict) blends archival footage and photographs with voice over of Beaton’s famed diaries to capture his legacy as a complex and unique creative force. Dynamic and lyrical, LOVE, CECIL is an examination of Beaton’s singular sense of the visual, which dictated a style that set standards of creativity that continue to resonate and inspire today.