Simone (Francesco Scianna) and Paolo Ferrari (Filippo Timi) are a few nights away from celebrating their twentieth wedding anniversary.  One evening, however, Paolo forgets his phone at the house and Simone intercepts some texts from a mysterious Ricardo (Mauro Conte) who has been having an affair with Paolo.  While this is happening, their son, Leone (Francesco Gheghi) is working on a documentary about how the Italian laws have been slow to evolve with the times and allow both Simone and Paolo to be legally recognized as his parents despite their seemingly solid and long-standing relationship. 

The Invisible Thread is a Netflix original written and directed by Marco Simon Puccioni with assistance on the page from Luca De Bei and Gianluca Bernardini.  The coming of age/family dramedy has an overwhelming amount of heart behind it and the cast fully embraces their characters, both their archetypes and their specific places within the narrative.  It also strikes a nice balance of highlighting the inequities in Italian family law, and while it does not use the Ferrari family as a case study, it does not shy away from highlighting the difficulties faced by LGBTQ+ parents when it comes to starting a legally recognized family unit. 

The film is a bit of a dueling narrative with Leo stuck in the middle of his feuding fathers while trying to balance his own budding relationship with Elisa (Alessia Giuliani), contending with his rock-climbing rival – and Elisa’s brother – Dario (Matteo Oscar Giuggioli), and maintaining his friendship with Jacopo (Emanuele Maria Di Stefano).  Gheghi has a wide-ranging role in the film as he grapples with these multiple relationships all constantly in flux, and to his credit, he makes for a very easy entry point into the film.  He always keeps up the façade of a wide-eyed, innocent teenager – even though the film does allow him to act out in rebellion at times – but by that point, he has captured the audience’s sympathies and we find ourselves rooting for him even when he is making some brash decisions fueled by a youthful sense of doing things his way. 

His parents, Paolo and Simone, do fall into the trap of being rude, self-centered, and catty in many of their actions.  There is an understandable base here as they are both reacting to their relationship being overturned, so they do find themselves experiencing a redemption arc as the plot unfolds.  In this way, they do become fully realized characters and while they are not perfect people, The Invisible Thread creates equality through its storytelling in showing that gay couples, like heterosexual couples, can grow apart, too.  There is a strange sense of sacredness in queer stories now that we have moved on from the tragedy of being gay and that all queer couples must be shown in pure light and that simply is not the case in real life. All relationships no matter the gender combination, are just a coupling of people and The Invisible Thread chooses to tell a very human story of love that was strong but has since faded. By the end of the film, we learn that their failed marriage is not the fault of a single individual, but that they were both failing to meet each other’s needs and the script is kind enough to treat them both with that basic level of respect and understanding. 

Turning back to Leo who is the central figure of which the story orbits, the complex dynamic which he shares with his friends fills a strange space in the context of the film. On one hand, it creates a lot of interesting scenarios as their involvements with one another continue to grow, morph, and expand, but on the other hand, it becomes a bit of a tug of war between what the film is truly trying to focus on with its story. Even within the friend group, there is a lot of competition for screen time and narrative importance, but by and large the younger cast all deliver genuine and true performances and while certain moments feel like they were included to pad the runtime up to 109 minutes, these bonds are just as important to The Invisible Thread as the cataclysmic paternal relationship which the film opens with. 

The Invisible Thread is a very unique film that addresses many social issues, while informed by Italian politics, can still be easily translated to Netflix’s worldwide streaming audience. It blends well elements of a family drama and a coming of age story to create a truly charming work. What is most inspiring about the story is the resilience of its characters and the uncompromising arc which the story follows. Its ending perfectly encapsulates what real life is like: somethings things get messy, but when you have people that truly do care about each other you make it work out in the end. It serves as a good reminder to us to remember those who have our back when we stand up for ourselves because at the end of the day all we have is each other.