Paolo Sorrentino’s La Grazia is about an ageing Italian president who is coming to the end of his seven-year term, and must reflect on decisions made, decisions yet to be made and the moral complexities of life. Unusually for Sorrentino, who has a liking for the showy – Hand of God, The Great Beauty, Il Divo and, for television, The New Pope – this is sober, melancholic and elegiac, and possibly the better for it. Plus, it stars Toni Servillo, which is always a win. I’ve just checked his back-catalogue and can confirm: always, always, always a win.

I’ve made him sound as exciting and personality-free as Keir Starmer, which isn’t fair

I’ve made him sound as exciting and personality-free as Keir Starmer, which isn’t fair

Servillo, who has starred in several of Sorrentino’s films and has a mesmerisingly hangdog, Walter Matthau quality, plays the president, Mariano De Santis. Italian presidents, I now know, don’t........

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