Vague Visages’ The Time It Takes review contains minor spoilers. Francesca Comencini’s 2024 movie features Romana Maggiora Vergano, Fabrizio Gifuni and Anna Mangiocavallo. Check out the VV home page for more film criticism, movie reviews and film essays.

The parent-child dynamic of The Time It Takes (Il tempo che ci vuole) mirrors my life in many ways: a conservative and successful father (Fabrizio Gifuni as Luigi) struggles with Parkinson’s disease while worrying about the future of his liberal offspring (Romana Maggiora Vergano as Francesca). The protagonists clash over politics and personal vices, yet their bond ensures a shared sense of understanding. Luigi, a prolific and practical filmmaker who values traditions and simple messaging, watches in agony as his beloved child makes poor decisions and seemingly gets pushed around by the world. However, Francesca doesn’t quite relate to her father’s point of view, as her life experiences and a willingness to push boundaries translates to creative independence and personal freedom. The Time It Takes is a deeply moving exploration of a father’s love.

I remember the first time I noticed a tremor in my father’s hand. Just like Francesca, it happened during one of my worst days, sitting in a hospital bed while recovering from a leg infection during the COVID-19 pandemic. The Time It Takes doesn’t openly acknowledge Luigi’s experience with Parkinson’s disease, at least through character dialogue, but all the symptoms appear onscreen — a shaking hand pushed behind the back, a stiff body and, of course, mental exhaustion. Comencini and cinematographer Luca Bigazzi use various two shots to elaborate on the central parent-child dynamic, with one person typically in the background and the other in the foreground. For much of the film, the theme of failure plagues both Luigi and Francesca, as the former character acknowledges criticisms about his work (too righteous, too conservative) while the latter protagonist sinks into a deep depression upon experimenting with drugs, resulting in a devastating yet ultimately enlightening confrontation sequence. “I’m disgusting,” Francesca says, fully expecting her father to cut her off or abandon her completely. But Luigi, always a loving father and gentleman, stays put and urges his child to “fail again… fail better.”  From there, The Time It Takes shifts from a traditional drama about interpersonal relationships to a dramedy about the lasting effects of cinema preservation and restoration, which in turn complements the recurring subtext about familial bonds, redemption and legacy.

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The term “Fellini-esque” applies to The Time It Takes. Comencini incorporates a series of light-hearted musical vignettes, such as when Young Francesca (Anna Mangiocavallo) gleefully walks with her filmmaker father as a child, or when the main protagonists joyfully discuss Georg Wilhelm Pabst’s 1932 classic Queen of Atlantis (Die Herrin von Atlantis) — one of the many films that the real Luigi saved from destruction by co-founding the Italian film archive Cineteca Italiana. Gifuni — who is best known for roles in Hannibal (2001) and Human Capital (2013) — maintains a moderate temperament throughout most of the film as Luigi, and maybe pushes a bit too far when his character expresses love for Roberto Rossellini’s 1946 classic Paisan (Paisà). But as Luigi’s health declines, it does indeed make sense that he’d feel emotional about the past while dealing with his present condition. Gifuni shares excellent chemistry with Vergano (one of Italy’s most promising actresses), who communicates Francesca’s inner turmoil through various facial expressions, ranging from joy to fear to disgust to shame and, ultimately, a sense of shared understanding with her father, evidenced by a full circle moment in which Francesca helps Luigi shave — not just because she’s a helpful daughter, but rather because she understands the significance of the act itself; a reminder of her childhood, a reminder of being lifted up and understood by her father when all seemed lost.

The Time It Takes Review: Related — Open Roads: New Italian Cinema Review – Stefano Sollima’s ‘Adagio’

As my own father deals with Parkinson’s disease like Luigi in The Time It Takes, I find value and truth in Comencini’s dialogue and themes. When discussing cinema, Gifuni’s character states that “it shows you what it finds.” Full disclosure: I feel like I’ve been communicating this same idea for years, in various forms, to family members who, like so many people around the world, view movies as pure entertainment and don’t understand the nuances of film criticism as an art form. “It’s over my head,” my father often says while reading this very site, perhaps because there’s too much to process for a casual moviegoer/streamer. But I — like Luigi, Francesca and so many other filmmakers and film critics — am just documenting/processing what cinema shows me about life (and the world at large) as I evolve from a film critic to something more — hopefully from son to husband and father, however long that might take.

In the Streaming Age, people continue to abandon movie theaters for a more comfortable viewing experience, one that doesn’t involve big screens, big emotions and two hours away from their phone. But cinematic productions like The Time It Takes show that theatrical movies can have a profound effect on people who want to know more about the medium and the craft of filmmaking.

The Time It Takes premiered on September 26, 2024 in Italy. The film screened at Open Roads: New Italian Cinema at Film at Lincoln Center in New York City on May 29, 2025.

Q.V. Hough (@QVHough) is Vague Visages’ founding editor. Thank you for reading film criticism, movie reviews and film essays at Vague Visages.

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