•
Rating: The Time It Takes
“There's life before cinema,” with this line, an excellent Fabrizio Gifuni, in the role of director Luigi Comencini, stuns his assistant on the set of the TV Pinocchio filmed in the early 70s. And indeed, this autobiographical film, directed by his daughter Francesca, talks about life through (or perhaps even across) cinema. At the forefront, for the entire duration of the film, is the story of the relationship between father and daughter, starting from when Francesca was a child, up to adulthood, with a significant time leap from childhood to full adolescence. The narrative mainly consists of episodes, many tied to the world of cinema, and is enriched by a substantial inclusion of silent film clips, rescued from destruction by Comencini himself in the early post-war years.
Comencini, with a somewhat disorienting choice in my opinion, decides to focus the whole film on her memory of her father and their intimate relationship, eliminating any other family member or peripheral figure. The result is a sincere and partly courageous construction, in which she lays bare her darkest period (those difficult years, from which she would draw her debut film), dominated by drug addiction, but also somewhat claustrophobic, especially during the long Parisian period, where her father dedicates himself entirely to her in an attempt to save her, even giving up work for “the time it takes” (and, as mentioned at the beginning, because life comes before cinema).
The dialogues are substantial, primarily discussing life, in the comparison between a father endowed with great fantasy and imagination and a fragile and insecure daughter, who, despite her father's love, struggles to find her place in the world, like when as a child, on the set of Pinocchio, she can't find the right direction to exit the scene being filmed.
Emotions are at play, many, and perhaps in the long run, a few too many, all concentrated in this tight-knit relationship, dosed with a certain degree of understandable modesty, but partly also restrained, so much so that the emotionality risks being diffused and even the right amount of emotion threatens to dissipate and vanish a bit too quickly. At certain climactic moments, it’s hard to go further, one stops beforehand, perhaps for fear of getting too involved or maybe not to dredge up too painful memories (at least that's the feeling I got, it's not necessarily that these are real flaws).
The film is rich with references and nods, in addition to Comencini’s obvious cinema, also to great Italian directors, Rossellini (with the clip from Paisà on TV) and De Sica in the flying finale. Shot with care, featuring some successful cross dissolves between landscapes and Pinocchio's whale, and extensively playing with the various focus planes in the father’s shots, as if they were memories emerging at those moments, and pacing time through the tragic news of the years of lead.
Gifuni’s performance is sublime, a great job done especially with the body, the movements that gradually shift from light and agile to slow and heavy, the expressiveness of the face that tells more than is said (highlighting a small short circuit that cannot but happen to the viewer when Gifuni, sitting on the couch, watches the news broadcasting images of Moro's body being found, and for a moment it seems like he is observing himself). Romana Maggiora Vergano is also very good as the adult daughter, as well as the little actress who plays her as a child (a trademark of the Comencini family).
A sincere film, relatively well-executed, considering the inherent risks in autobiographical productions. Personally, it did not spark a flame; perhaps it missed the breakthrough moment (despite the ending), but it’s interesting in many of its aspects.
Loading comments slowly
