As teased with a barely 45-second clip on Wednesday, here’s the full trailer for George Miller’s Three Thousand Years of Longing. Yes, it is in fact spelled like that, in case you were wondering why it’s not 3000 Years of Longing, though we’re sure that theater owners across the country will do so to fit it on their little electronic signs telling you where the hell to go when you get in the multiplex. It looks, in a word, fantastic. It’s always kind of a fool’s errand to expect anything when it comes to George Miller: The guy has made his career subverting expectations at every single corner, pursuing his mad vision for whatever project that he’s working on. But this looks like a legitimate epic in scope and scale, which is a bit of a far cry from what we imagined when we first read the synopsis ages ago back when it was announced. Get hyped, folks.
Peep it:
Here’s a synopsis straight from MGM:
“Dr Alithea Binnie (Tilda Swinton) is an academic – content with life and a creature of reason. While in Istanbul attending a conference, she happens to encounter a Djinn (Idris Elba) who offers her three wishes in exchange for his freedom. This presents two problems. First, she doubts that he is real and second, because she is a scholar of story and mythology, she knows all the cautionary tales of wishes gone wrong. The Djinn pleads his case by telling her fantastical stories of his past. Eventually she is beguiled and makes a wish that surprises them both.”
Three Thousand Years of Longing premieres at Cannes this week and will make its way to our side of the Atlantic on August 31. We’re betting cash money it’ll be better than 3000 Miles to Graceland, but you never know: Miller might have an Elvis impersonator or two up his sleeves.