THE cinematic experience, as we know it, took a hit this week. With yet another rescheduling for No Time To Die - the latest James Bond blockbuster announced - until next Spring - came the news that Cineworld, Britain’s largest multiplex chain, was throwing in the towel. For the time being at least.

And yet, new features continue to wind there way to audiences across the globe.

This week, Netflix offers The 40-Year Old Version, a debut feature for Radha Blank and award winner at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. Back when such events still happened.

A top writing, directing and producing the film, Blank stars too. Indeed, it is a fictionalised version of herself to whom the title refers.

The film’s version of Radha is a once promising playwright now careering towards a middle age in the doldrums. A witty gag sees her knees crack at every bend. Rather than living her dream in Broadway, we find Radha stuck teaching theatre to a hodgepodge melee of teens. It’s what pays the bills. She yearns to break out but fears the arrival of her 40s spells the end of the road.

Clearly proud of her own roots, Blank wears her inspirations upon her sleeve with The 40 Year Old Version. Whilst the title homages Judd Apatow’s hit comedy, The 40 Year Old Virgin, Blank’s decision to shoot her film in crisp black and white - and on a 35mm film - recalls the early work of Spike Lee.

Not that this is Blank’s first brush in with the legendary director. In 2017, she co-produced the television series She’s Gotta Have It, based on Lee’s eponymous film.

Here, Blank’s alter ego finds reinvigoration in a return to her long-lost passion for rap. When the play she has been plugging finally gets going, however, Radha puts recording a rap demo on the back burner and must navigate the awful tension of compromising her voice for career success.

Witty and neatly crafted, The 40 Year Old Version is a pleasure to watch. If it’s a tad too long, that’s no matter.

This feels like a moment of arrival for a talent and long may that continue. Blank has a strong and fiercely funny voice and she’s ready to be heard. While it’s her comic timing that shines here, Radha’s ability to convey her message through it resonates.