The Orpheus is showing Nine this week, a sumptuously visual film starring Daniel Day-Lewis alongside a fine supporting cast of female acting talent including Judi Dench, Penelope Cruz, Nicole Kidman, Sophia Loren, Kate Hudson and Marion Cotillard.

Day-Lewis is Guido Contini, a famous film director unable to write the screenplay for his new movie and caught hopelessly between the women in his life: his wife (Cotillard), mistress (Cruz), muse (Kidman), mother (Loren), costume designer (Dench) and a journalist (Hudson).

As ever, Day-Lewis puts in a scintillating lead performance as a flawed genius, playing to the crowd, appeasing his bosses while remaining deeply unhappy and a magnet for inappropriate relationships with inappropriate femme fatals.

Rob Marshall’s delightful film switches from colour to black and white, from the present day to the past, from memory to reality, never losing pace.

Although the songs are not memorable, the set pieces most certainly are, and some of the locations are simply fabulous.

I went to see Nine on a whim, and was very pleased that I did so. I would not usually choose to see a musical at the cinema, but Nine is certainly not your usual musical.

Any film with Day-Lewis is worth a look, and the delightful and entrancing Nine does not disappoint.