Film Review - 3,000 Years of Longing (2022)

 3,000 Years of Longing is based off of a novel and is directed and co-written by Dr George Miller best known for the Mad Max series as well as Babe, Happy Feet and Lorenzo’s Oil among other films and stars Tilda Swinton as Alithea a Narratologist in London who on a trip to Istanbul for a conference she picks up a strange bottle and when she opens it out comes a Djinn (or Genie) plated by Idris Elba and well Alithea has never had a friend, never had a friend, never had a friend like Hiiimmmmm.

 

Sorry I couldn’t resist.

 

3,000 Years of Longing may well be one of my favourite films of the year as the more I sat with the film after seeing it the more it really won me over and firstly this film is not the strange trip through time where the Djinn sees the galloping hordes, a hundred bad guys with swords, 75 golden camels, exotic type mammals and a whole new world with a new fantastic point of view that the preview for this movie tells you it is instead its more of a love story at its core and it really worked for me as it felt very heartfelt and Swinton and Elba have great chemistry together.

 

Secondly the films historical moments when the Djinn is telling his history to Alithea do show off that wild imagination that has help make George Miller one of my personal favourite directors, those moments really come to life and feel big and wild and could only have come from the man that gave us Mad Max and Mad Max 2 with the Toecutter and his bikers, the Humungous and his gang, the Immortan clan etc and those moments are great even if over advertised in the preview.

 

And lastly I really liked the whole concept of a Narratologist a person who spends their working life devoted to the study of stories, histories, mythology and how they might all interweave within each other in more ways than we might think they do and while the film runs a little long at times I was really taken with this one.

 

I must also say that there were times where I kept thinking of Disney’s Aladdin especially with some of the wishing aspects of this film I sat there thinking “But remember the love rule in Aladdin” or “It never fails you get in the bath and there’s a rub at the lamp.”

 

And so that was 3,000 Years of Longing and I really enjoyed this movie, its romantic, imaginative and tells an interesting story, this is a sight lovely to see on the big screen but remember those rules when you rub that bottle or lamp the Genie knows his stuff, 4 out of 5.