Bill Nighy appears in About Time, his fourth film for Richard Curtis, the maker of Notting Hill. Picture: Getty Images. RICHARD Curtis writes films redolent with common wisdom. His greatest attribute is writing in such a way that viewers believe it to be uncommon wisdom. Or he presents it in such an alluring fashion, men cry and women go weak at the knees. So it is with About Time, the latest film by the writer of Black-Adder, Four Weddings and a Funeral and Notting Hill and director of Love, Actually and The Boat That Rocked. The absurdity of the film's central conceit -- that the male line of one family can travel through time -- is forgotten as Curtis explores the beauty and foibles of relationships across generations and, most effectively, father-son relationships. The film is being marketed as a romantic comedy in which boy Tim (Domhnall Gleeson, soon to be in Australia to film Angelina Jolie's Unbroken) meets girl Mary (Rachel McAdams), and loses girl until he time-travels. But the film's core is the gorgeous rendering of Tim's relationship with his father (Bill Nighy). The script arrived at the right time for Nighy, who has starred in three previous Curtis films, including the telemovie The Girl in the Cafe, and also in the recent short film The Banker, in support of the "Robin Hood Tax" concept, a proposed levy on the financial sector. "You can sign up and watch me squirm at robinhoodtax.org.uk," Nighy notes. Nighy was in his Melbourne hotel room while filming the still-to-be-released I, Frankenstein for Stuart Beattie. "It's always a good day when something turns up from Richard," he says. You're supposed to be a grown-up and read the script and assess the situation but he's never sent me stuff other than what I want to do. The central tenet of About Time was particularly prescient, he adds. "It's a simple film with a simple suggestion but in its way it's the thing we all struggle with, I guess: how to make the most out of everything," Nighy says. I liked the whole ethos of the movie. Because you get to my age (63) and you look at the clock and think you have to make the most of everything. I can't afford to allow my head to steal any more days off me by making me regret yesterday or worry about tomorrow. Nighy admits he has been trying to focus on "the beauty around us without sounding, well, I always feel I have to qualify in some way but that's exactly what I've been doing. And then this film comes along. It was good timing. Nighy's market research on a new film consists of the number of phone calls he receives from friends or "people you haven't heard from for a long time" and being stopped in the street. He laughs. I keep getting calls. "It's obviously hit the spot," he says, laughing, before defining the films he is stopped to discuss. If they're young men between 14 and 27, it's anything by Simon Pegg, Nick Frost and Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz); if they're under nine, it's usually Pirates of the Caribbean. In fact Pirates covers everybody," he says, laughing. In France, The Boat that Rocked was a big hit, although it was some time before he realised the film was called Good Morning England there. That took me a while to get used to because on occasion I am congratulated for being in films I wasn't in. That's reasonably common," he says. Then there's the popular The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel. Shooting for its sequel will start in the new year. Nighy is on a fine late-career run. It helps when Curtis hands you captivating characters. "Yes, it's beautifully expressed and it's funny and kind of recognisable," Nighy says. The story was particularly pertinent for Curtis, who'd lost both his parents recently. The film's lovely portrayal of a father-son relationship ends with a heartbreaking shot and the deft use of a ballad by Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds. Nighy's character is wise, amusing and charismatic, an actor's dream. "I'm interested in playing as naturally as possible and in parts where you don't have to put any bells on," he says. You just do it as honestly as you can and try and be normal and relaxed, so there was an opportunity for that. One might imagine the final, emotion-wringing scenes in a Richard Curtis film may take their toll on actors. Yes and no, Nighy says. "The thing is, strictly speaking, you're working, so you give the appearance of whatever is required," he says. You act it and the audience gets emotional. That's how it's supposed to be. Generally speaking, you don't have to be in an emotional state to deliver those scenes, you just have to appear to be. But occasionally they get you and these were particularly powerful for everybody really because everyone's been a part of that relationship, everyone has a father, and there are those of us who have children. Of his co-star Domhnall Gleeson (actor Brendan Gleeson's son), Nighy says the young man works without fuss, which makes those intense scenes all the easier. "But they're hardcore scenes in their way," he adds of the familial relationship. They don't mess around, they're big themes and they deal with them pretty head on. So they're affecting. Has he had chats about mortality with his own daughter? "We talk about such things but we keep it light for the most part," Nighy says. I think, as far as I know -- it's a sort of trite thing to say or an obvious remark -- but children I presume are the meaning of life. It doesn't mean to say the relationship has to be any good because a relationship is a relationship. But I'm blessed I'm on pretty good terms with my daughter. "I have a very annoying habit, which is whenever she admires anything in my apartment, I'll say: 'You know, one day all this will be yours!"' "And she says, 'Oh Dad, shut up!"' he says. That's as near as we get to any deep talk about mortality, her telling me to shut up. About Time opens on October 17.