Felice (Pierfrancesco Favino) is a gentle, loving son who returns after 40 years from Egypt to the crumbled, faded charms of his old neighbourhood in Naples. He is there to see his frail and elderly mother (the wonderful Aurora Quattrocchi), who he finds in a dingy downstairs flat, forced out of her much nicer one upstairs by the local standover boss, Oreste Spasiano (Tommaso Ragno).

The story is a slow burn and requires patience as small hints are dropped and we start to piece together a bigger story. Felice quizzes an old friend of his mother about the whereabouts of a childhood friend but the man pretends not to know. We realise he is talking about Oreste, and eventually – with the help of grainy flashbacks – we see them together as teenagers, riding around pillion on a motorbike. Friends for life, they thought.

As the memories flood back, Felice delays his return to Cairo. He finds his mother a garden flat for her last days and begins to fall into the rhythms of Italian life. His Islamic rituals, followed at the start, are now barely observed and he starts to look for a house, thinking he might live here. His mother dies, but he stays on and befriends the local priest, Padre Luigi (Francesco Di Leva), who offers much more than pastoral support. In this Italian neighbourhood, the priest is a player.

Then the secret lands and we see there is unfinished business between Felice and Oreste. Felice’s experience remains frozen at the time he was sent away overnight by his family to Lebanon. From there, he found his way to a new life, with a job and a wife in Cairo. But he still loves and misses his friend, and wants to make things right. Oreste, though, felt abandoned and has grown embittered. He lives in a thug’s prison, protected by gun-toting security and trusting no one.

The story is quintessentially Italian in its emphasis on honour and the problematic bonds of family and brotherhood. It is Padre Luigi who introduces Felice around, and in doing so throws a shadow of protection over him. It is also Padre Luigi who tells him it is in everyone’s interests for him to leave.

Favino ­– a familiar face from the Italian film The Traitor, with Hollywood crossovers in World War Z and Rush – brings a bemused affection to the role, even as the atmosphere grows more tense. He has the best of intentions as he looks forward to building a new life from the old. If only everyone felt the same.

Nostalgia is showing as part of the Italian Film Festival, which is at Palace Nova Eastend Cinemas and Palace Nova Prospect until October 16 (timetable here).