MEETING Sir Michael Caine and the London headquarters of The Magic Circle to talk retirement, death and life beyond it – it was never going to be an ordinary day.

Sir Michael turns in one of his most memorable performances of recent years in his latest film, Is Anybody There? He plays Clarence, a retired magician who strikes up an unlikely friendship with a young boy living in a retirement home.

I wondered what appealed to him about making the story?

“I’ve read many scripts that made me laugh, but this one made me cry too,” he says, succinctly.

And what about the acting talent? In the film he works alongside some well-matured greats including Leslie Phillips, Peter Vaughan, Rosemary Harris and the late Elizabeth Spriggs. Does even Michael Caine feel daunted up against that kind of talent?

“I knew them from the screen as a fan, and I had that respect for them. The most impressive thing for me was working with Anne-Marie [Duff, who plays Edward’s mum and long-suffering keeper of the home]. I didn’t know at the time of her theatrical past, and suddenly I read in the Evening Standard that she’s been awarded best actress for Joan of Arc at the National. My whole attitude towards her changed.”

And 14-year-old Bill Milner sparkles as Edward...

“It was as though I was acting with an adult actor.

“I was taught the Stanislavski method. One of the things that struck me was the phrase, ‘rehearsal is the work, performance is the relaxation’. That’s what I look for in very good film actors. And that’s what I got with the entire cast with this picture.”

Clarence suffers from dementia in the film, as did one of Sir Michael’s close friends (the late Dougie Hayward, tailor to the stars). How did it feel playing a role so close to his heart?

“I brought a lot of experience of how it was to suffer from dementia because Dougie was one of my closest friends. He died while we were making the film.

“I’d been waiting for me to walk into a room and for Dougie to ask me who I was. And one day he did. Clarence is as accurate a portrayal of dementia as I can do with my talent.”

We’re used to seeing Caine on the big screen wow us again and again – but what was his first ever cinema experience?

“The Lone Ranger came on and that’s what I wanted to be, I wanted to be a movie actor,” he says.

“Well, it didn’t happen quite like that. The film came on and it suddenly went blank. Then I released that someone had thrown a jacket over my head. I’d never been to the cinema before, so I didn’t quite know what was going on.

“Then there was a punch-up and the row I was in went over backwards because some boys had taken the screws out of the floor. That was my first experience of motion pictures!”

In the film we see Edward desperately trying to capture supernatural sounds on his tape recorder. Does Sir Michael believe in a life after this one, and has he ever had his own ghoulish encounter?

“I’ve never had a supernatural experience. Maybe my whole life is a supernatural experience,” he chuckles.

“I’d dearly love to think that there is somebody there. And I’ve got a lot of backup. My father was a Catholic, my mother was a Protestant, I was educated by Jews and I’m married to a Muslim. So I won’t lose out on a technicality!

“But when I do a role like this I don’t think of my mortality, I think of yours. All you people are going to die and I’m going to show you how it’s done. Because I’m not going to do it,” he says, smirking.

But just on the off-chance the Grim Reaper does come and fetch him one day, what would Sir Michael like to have etched on his gravestone?

“See you later, no hurry.”

Is Anybody There? is released on Friday.