Men of the Cloth: A celebration of devotion and craft
Subject – the dying art of Italian tailoring.
An inspiring portrait of three Italian master tailors with a passionate devotion to their Old World trade
A fashion journalist specializing in the menswear industry, Viki Vasilopoulos has recorded extensive interviews with aging master tailors Nino Corvato, Joe Centofanti and Checchino Fonticoli at their places of work (in New York, Pennsylvania and Italy respectively).
Joe Centofanti says he tries to get better everyday, no matter how old he gets, because he loves his work and takes pride in creating great suits. He dreams about tailoring.
Nino Corvato says tailoring is a beautiful art that is disappearing. He wants to leave a legacy and train people to carry on the tradition.
Nino Corvato says tailoring is a beautiful art that is disappearing. He wants to leave a legacy and train people to carry on the tradition.
The Globe and Mail said:
Clothes make the man, and some men make lovely clothes in director Vicki Vasilopoulos’s documentary Men of the Cloth, a celebration of traditional Italian tailors, whose artistic lineage goes back to the Renaissance.
The film focuses on three men:
Madison Avenue tailor Nino Corvato, who caters to celebrities and New Yorkers with a penchant for Ivy League style;
Joe Centofanti, a Philadelphia man in his 90s who made suits for British officers when he was in an African prison camp, and is determined to pass on his art to a young apprentice.
And in Italy,
Checchino Fonticoli, who trained as a traditional tailor but now works in an assembly-line operation for Brioni, the major employer in the picturesque town of Penne.
All three men are convivial subjects, passionate about beautiful clothing for their customers, and through the film you probably learn more about fitting, cutting, baste stitching and refitting than you’ll ever need to know.
What’s lacking is any sense of how this pampered packaging fits into the economic and social order of contemporary clothing, and why it matters.
Even the basic journalistic information is lacking: You’ll have to look elsewhere, for example, to learn that Nino Corvato made David Letterman’s double-breasted suits, or to discover that Corvato’s prices start at a relatively modest $3,000.
We know Michelangelo was paid 400 florins to create the naked statue of David, so why is it indelicate to ask what his artistic descendant charges to make a smart suit?
Source: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/arts/film/men-of-the-cloth-a-celebration-of-devotion-and-craft/article19552091/
http://vimeo.com/15331713 Trailer
Link: http://nowtoronto.com/movies/story.cfm?content=198813
Another interesting thing about the film is that the film maker raised money on Kickstarter ($20,000) to take the film to festivals and otherwise promote it. http://kck.st/WfNpbY
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