'Meditative' is not perhaps the epithet that comes to mind in relation to most films, but it is entirely apt when applied to Paolo Sorrentini's new film, Youth, which will no doubt be fallen upon avidly by the many admirers of his previous film, The Great Beauty (2013). Several minutes before the opening title, Youth begins with a young woman singing 'You've got the love I need to see me through'; we wonder if some sort of thematic announcement is being made. But Sorrentini is subtler than that.

So what is the film meditating on? Its essential preoccupations are with age and memory, how memory connects age with youth, though not always accurately. Youth is what age tries to remember, sometimes only to reshape it. Or are we more likely to accept what one character claims: 'You say emotions are overrated, but emotions are all we've got'? Or, whereas youth is prepared to be guided by such a dictum and to act rashly as a result, does age settle for more caution?