In Francis Ford Coppola's surreal fantasy Youth Without Youth - based on a novella by Romanian philosopher and religious historian Mircea Eliade (1907-86) - lightning strikes an elderly professor and returns him to the prime of youthful adulthood. Osvaldo Golijov's score ties together the film's most striking elements, including its romantically charged atmosphere, largely Eastern European settings and the pervasive feeling of time suspended. “Refugee”, for example, evokes the world of Enescu's Romanian Rhapsodies with a twangy cimbalom accompanied by an accordion's jaunty oompahs. “Veronica's Nightmare” features the throaty sound of the kamancheh (a Persian string instrument) singing over a nervous flutter of strings.

There are some unexpected references, too. “Farewell” pays overt homage to Astor Piazzolla's Milonga del angel, and its sultry lyricism dovetails neatly with the score's overall mood. Indeed, Golijov is at his most engaging when evoking a wistful nostalgia, most pronounced in “Love Lost”, segments which glance achingly back to the Adagietto of Mahler's Fifth Symphony (used in Visconti's cinematic adaptation of Thomas Mann's Death in Venice).

The performances by the Bucharest Metropolitan Orchestra are superb; the electronically enhanced effects - like the suggestion of a ticking clock in “Dominic's Nightmare” - are sewn seamlessly into the music's fabric; and, most impressive of all, the score's varied ingredients coalesce to produce a coherent, satisfyingly bittersweet flavour.