After finishing his trip to Geneva, Simon flew to Florence the next day, where Gucci's headquarters are located.
Sophia hoped that Simon could appear in the Gucci documentary. All day on the 24th, Simon wandered around Florence with Tom Ford, the new Gucci creative director, followed by cameras.
Ford's September 1990 Gucci Spring/Summer fashion collection would draw inspiration from this oldest cultural and artistic centre in the world.
As hosts, the Gucci family specially prepared a banquet for Simon that evening at their estate in the Florence countryside.
To be precise, it was the branch of Aldo Gucci, the eldest son of the second generation of Gucci, who invited Simon.
Of the three sons of Guccio Gucci, the founder of Gucci, two had already passed away, leaving only the eldest, Aldo, who was the one reported by his nephew and sent to prison for tax evasion a few years ago.
During the last equity transaction, some members of the Gucci family, for tax avoidance considerations, emigrated overseas. Only Aldo Gucci's second and third sons remained in Italy. Aldo's eldest son also had a strained relationship with his father and lived in New York year-round.
Years of various upheavals had caused the Gucci family to lose much of its prestige in Italy, but they still retained some underlying influence.
Especially with Simon Westeros, a newly emerging global wealth magnate and Hollywood tycoon, as a guest this time, the Gucci family's estate was once again filled with guests for the first time in many years.
Many political and business figures from Italy attended, and a large number of entertainment industry personalities, drawn by Simon, were also present.
Even Aldo Gucci, who had initially insisted on not selling the family company and still firmly held 20% of Gucci's shares, had significantly changed his attitude towards Simon because of this banquet, which brought the Gucci family back into the spotlight.
With no language barrier, Simon skilfully socialized among the guests until 10 PM before excusing himself and leaving.
Aldo Gucci, at the venerable age of 83, had not yet retired for the night. He personally, along with his two younger sons and a large group of dignitaries, escorted Simon and Sophia out of the Gucci family estate.
Inside the car, as the brightly lit Gucci family estate disappeared from view, Sophia said, "Now, it will be even harder for us to acquire the remaining shares of the Gucci family".
Simon naturally understood Sophia's meaning.
Gucci's recovery had been evident for several months.
If Gucci had continued its previous state of decline, after a few years, the Gucci family would certainly have divested all their shares.
But now, even the least capable members of the Gucci family understood that holding onto their shares and relying on Simon Westeros was the long-term strategy.
"We can't monopolize all the benefits. Controlling a majority stake in Gucci is enough. Once Gucci's operations stabilize, we can shift our resources and energy to other luxury brands", Simon said, then chuckled, "Moreover, the Gucci family might have used my name a bit this time, but similarly, if we achieved 100% control of Gucci, the Gucci family certainly wouldn't have acted this way. We would have been like outsiders in Italy, completely in the dark and sidelined. This leveraging of influence is mutual".
Sophia nodded in agreement.
Simon had merely socialized at the party, but she had genuinely met many local figures who could potentially assist Gucci's future operations.
Remembering this, Sophia was about to bring up the matter of Cannes again when the car suddenly slowed down and then stopped.
Simon looked forward in confusion and asked, "Neil, what's wrong?"
Before Neil Bennett could speak, someone knocked on the car window a few times.
Simon looked out cautiously but saw a woman's face faintly appearing outside the window. Recognizing her, he rolled down the window and said, "Miss Ferilli, what are you doing here?"
The woman's name was Sabrina Ferilli, an actress.
Earlier at the Gucci party, Sabrina Ferilli had eagerly approached Simon several times and left her business card, which was how Simon barely remembered her name.
As the car window rolled down, Sabrina Ferilli's pretty, pitiful face appeared before Simon, saying, "Mr. Westeros, my car broke down. Could I hitch a ride?"
Sabrina Ferilli said, pointing to a black sedan on the side of the road with smoke coming from its engine.
Simon glanced at the car in the headlight, feeling a little helpless and amused.
He hadn't expected to encounter such a cliché trick, and judging by the smoke from the car, this woman had really gone all out; that car was definitely broken, perhaps even scrapped.
This was the southern suburb of Florence, where various mansions and estates were concentrated. Simon's own estate in the city was also nearby, less than five kilometres away by car.
Ultimately, he couldn't leave a young woman stranded in the countryside, so Simon had no choice but to open the car door and let Sabrina Ferilli squeeze in, sharing the back seat with him and Sophia.
In the front were two bodyguards.
It was well-known that kidnappings were rampant in Italy. When Simon was in Los Angeles, many people advised him to bring more escorts when they heard he was going to Italy. So, he specifically brought four bodyguards for this European trip.
Jennifer wasn't with them tonight, so Simon left two bodyguards at his estate.
With an outsider present, Simon and Sophia stopped their previous conversation.
Sabrina Ferilli seemed very talkative, her lightly dressed, fiery body unreservedly pressed against Simon.
She chattered on, asking all sorts of questions about Hollywood, specifically expressing envy that Valeria Golino could play Catwoman in 'Batman', and boldly asked Simon if he could take her to Hollywood to develop her career.
Because they weren't far, Simon's car quickly drove into another estate.
Compared to his other European residences, what Simon liked most about this estate in the Florence suburbs was its stone wall, over two meters high, which completely enclosed the five-acre property with a total length exceeding six hundred meters.
When Simon first saw the information for this estate, although the Italian-style villa within didn't quite match his aesthetic, he bought it without hesitation.
Everyone got out of the car. Simon, now smelling of perfume from being pressed against the fiery Sabrina Ferilli, asked, "Miss Ferilli, where do you live? I'll have the driver take you back".
Sabrina Ferilli clung to him again without reservation, linking her arm through Simon's: "Simon, can I stay here for the night? I've been staying in a hotel these past two days, and I always feel like someone is following me".
Sophia saw Simon being entangled and winked at him, walking towards the villa with a smile on her lips.
Simon felt that if he forced this woman to leave, she might pull another stunt, perhaps even faint in his arms. He had no choice but to wave to the two bodyguards, telling them to rest in the annex, and walked towards the main villa with Sabrina Ferilli.
In the villa's living room.
Jennifer hadn't rested yet. Seeing Simon enter with a tall, curvaceous woman, a hint of resentment immediately appeared on her face, and her tone became a bit colder.
She changed her address and said, "Boss, the results of the Cannes Film Festival awards are out".
As she spoke, the female assistant handed Simon a folder and turned to walk upstairs.
Simon took the folder, then reluctantly reached out and pulled back the assistant who was about to leave, saying, "Miss Ferilli's car broke down; she's just staying here for the night".
With her hand held by Simon and hearing him explain to her, some of the bitterness in Jennifer's heart dissipated. She allowed Simon to lead her to sit on the living room sofa.
Sabrina Ferilli was clearly a smart person. Seeing Simon and Jennifer's affectionate attitude, and that the young tycoon clearly valued the assistant more, she wisely refrained from getting closer to Simon and sat obediently on a nearby sofa.
When Sophia came into the living room with a pot of coffee, Sabrina even eagerly got up to take the tray and poured coffee for everyone.
Unconsciously, the living room of the villa once again presented a situation of one man and three women, with women outnumbering men.
Janette had said a long time ago that Simon's personality was like a lion. Unbeknownst to him, this aspect of his personality seemed to become more pronounced, and even the senior management within his company gradually showed a trend of women outnumbering men.
Simon also found that, although sometimes the women around him were no less cunning than men, he was still more accustomed to this situation.
Florence and Cannes have roughly an hour's time difference. Tonight happened to be the closing ceremony of Cannes.
Simon had previously received an invitation from Cannes officials to attend the closing ceremony but had chosen to decline.
Pulling his female assistant to sit in the living room, Simon opened the file with the Cannes award results.
Although many films from his memory appeared as expected, the results of the 42nd Cannes Film Festival awards this time surprised Simon.
The biggest variable was undoubtedly the Palme d'Or.
In his memory, the Palme d'Or winner was Steven Soderbergh's 'Sex, Lies, and Videotape'. Because the president of the jury for this film festival was Wim Wenders, Simon had previously thought that this German film director, whose films always conveyed a sense of emptiness and alienation, would favour Soderbergh's film, which depicted the confused lives of young people at the tail end of America's Best Generation.
However…
The actual result was that the Palme d'Or winner this year became Giuseppe Tornatore's 'Cinema Paradiso'.
Thinking about it carefully, 'Cinema Paradiso' was equally deserving of the Palme d'Or and also leaned towards Wim Wenders' preferences.
Moreover, delving deeper, Simon realized that this difference in award results should be due to the different distributor of 'Sex, Lies, and Videotape' compared to the original timeline.
The original distributor of 'Sex, Lies, and Videotape' was Miramax, and the Weinstein brothers' skilled public relations tactics were well-known.
Now, the film's distributor had become Columbia Pictures.
Although Columbia Pictures was many levels above the current Miramax, in terms of award lobbying, which required a lot of effort, Columbia's team clearly lacked the connections and experience of the Weinstein brothers, who focused on art-house films and had been active in Europe for years.
Of course, 'Sex, Lies, and Videotape' did not go home empty-handed; it received the Grand Prix, the second-highest award at the Cannes Film Festival.
As for 'My Left Foot', it only received one award: Best Actor.
Daniel Day-Lewis's performance was indeed well-deserved for this award.
Simon had never intended for 'My Left Foot' to contend for the Palme d'Or from the beginning. He was pleased with the current results, especially with 'Cinema Paradiso' winning the Palme d'Or.
This wasn't because he felt a sense of satisfaction seeing 'Sex, Lies, and Videotape' lose. The main reason was that the previous Palme d'Or went to 'Pulp Fiction', a Hollywood film.
If this year's Palme d'Or was also a Hollywood film, then for the next few years, for reasons of balance and such, the likelihood of Hollywood winning the Palme d'Or again would be very low.
While the Cannes Film Festival officials could hardly interfere with the award results, the judges involved in the award selection would certainly understand that continuously awarding the Palme d'Or to Hollywood was definitely not a wise decision on their part.
After all, the majority of the jury members were usually European filmmakers. If they showed too much favouritism, it would also be a huge detriment to their own interests.
Furthermore, Jane Campion's film 'Sweetie', which Simon had been interested in, received no awards.
Jennifer recovered from her earlier jealousy and picked up a script from the coffee table, explaining to Simon, "This was sent over by Deutchman in the evening. It's Tornatore's new film script, called 'Everybody's Fine', about an old man who travels around to visit his scattered children after retirement.
Deutchman said he had talked with Tornatore twice, but the other party seemed to be waiting for the Cannes award results, so he didn't immediately accept our cooperation invitation".
Sabrina Ferilli, who had been sitting quietly nearby, heard that a director from her country had won the Palme d'Or, and her eyes lit up.
Now, seeing the script in Jennifer's hand, her expression showed even more eagerness.
She didn't dare to hope for a direct leap into Hollywood like Valeria Golino did with a Venice Best Actress award, but playing a role in an Italian film invested by Daenerys Entertainment would still be a stepping stone.
Unfortunately, she didn't understand much English and missed Jennifer's words implying that Daenerys hadn't finalized a deal with Tornatore. She thought Simon would invest in this film.
Everyone was waiting for the best offer, and Simon wasn't surprised.
He had already watched Jane Campion's 'Sweetie' when he was in Geneva. Although the New Zealand production company seemed very eager, they also didn't immediately accept Daenerys Entertainment's offer to purchase the film, clearly waiting for the award results.
Giuseppe Tornatore's choice was within expectations.
In fact, due to the shift in award results, Simon felt that the possibility of Daenerys Entertainment acquiring 'Cinema Paradiso' at a reasonable price had significantly decreased.
Evidently, with the Palme d'Or halo, even if the original Italian version of the film was quite protracted and long, Hollywood distributors would certainly not mind competing for it, especially since Daenerys Entertainment had already made an offer.
In his memory, this film's North American box office was only around ten million dollars, and that was with the Weinstein brothers' careful campaigning resulting in a Best Foreign Language Film award, with the North American theatrical version also being edited.
Once a bidding war started, even if Daenerys forcibly acquired the film, there wouldn't be much room for profit.
Now, the Weinstein brothers clearly couldn't reach for this film; they didn't have the power.
But if the film fell into the hands of other distributors, the outcome was hard to predict.
Just like Luc Besson's Cannes opening film 'The Big Blue' last year, the movie achieved record-breaking box office in France, but when it fell into the hands of Hollywood distributors, after a series of haphazard changes and releases, the film completely flopped.