Movie Review: THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING

By ABBIE BERNSTEIN / Staff Writer

Posted: August 19th, 2022 / 11:40 PM

THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING movie poster

Rating: R
Stars: Tilda Swinton, Idris Elba
Writers: George Miller & Augusta Gore, based on the short story “The Djinn in the Nightingale’s Eye”
Director: George Miller
Distributor: M-G-M
Release Date: August 26, 2022

THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING is the first feature George Miller has directed and co-written since 2015’s MAD MAX: FURY ROAD. Apart from both being terrific and having a lot of desert imagery, the two films could hardly be more different.

Where MAD MAX: FURY ROAD is full of practical action in the service of a straightforward story, THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING is fantastical, with tales within tales.

More, where the characters in MAD MAX: FURY ROAD are mostly terse and brusque, our protagonists in THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING live for storytelling, their own and others.

THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING is narrated by Alithea (Tilda Swinton), who insists that what she says actually happened. However, she’s putting it in the format of a fairytale to make it easy for us to accept.

By her accent, Alithea sounds like she’s originally from northern England. However, she’s a narratologist – that is, someone who studies narrative – now living in London.

During a break from a literary conference in Istanbul, Turkey, Alithea picks up an old glass bottle while doing some sight-seeing. Back in her hotel room, she cleans the bottle, i.e., rubs it, and an honest-to-goodness Djinn (Idris Elba) emerges.

For quite a few people, the mere idea of Elba as a wish-granting genie will be enough to spur a ticket purchase.

But wait, there’s more!

The Djinn is desperate for Alithea to make her three wishes so that he can be set free. But Alithea, professionally familiar with the many legends and fables about the granting of wishes, knows that the desires can be all too easily turned against the wish-makers. She emphatically does not wish to be tricked.

The Djinn protests that he is no trickster. To prove it, he regales Alithea of how he came to be trapped, several times, in the bottle. The Djinn’s past extends back three thousand years. Even when it is tragic, it is magnificent to behold.

Director George Miller and his co-screenwriter Augusta Gore, working from the short story “The Djinn in the Nightingale’s Eye” by A.S. Byatt, have woven a marvelous tapestry. As each visually opulent section unfolds, we are enchanted by the mythical aspects. At the same time, we are increasingly invested in the curiosity and increasingly urgent tension between Alithea and the Djinn.

It probably doesn’t need saying, but for the record, Swinton, who has an elfin quality herself, is perfectly paired with the heartfelt, powerful Elba. Both performers understand that their characters are literally made more vital by storytelling, and both know how to demonstrate this wordlessly as words swirl about and between them.

THREE THOUSAND YEARS OF LONGING is swooningly romantic and breathtakingly gorgeous. It is also smart, funny, and wonderfully humane. It is entirely worthy of the highest recommendation.

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