It sometimes teeters on the edge of complacency, but it has a trance-inducing strangeness and Swinton is insouciantly magnetic at all times.

Orlando’s story is not confined to 1928, nor 1992. It does not fade, it does not wither, it does not grow old. It lives as long as Orlando does.

Potter's ironies, veering between the blunt and the exquisite, the oblique and the confrontational, expose the cruel hazards of nature and the perversities of culture.

This high-concept period piece can be slow-moving at times, but it's brought to life by stunning costumes and set pieces, and a perfectly cast central performance by Swinton.