From the director of Mad Max: Fury Road, the fantasy film has two huge stars.
Our TV movie pick for tonight (Friday, 14 February) is Three Thousand Years of Longing, the film legendary director George Miller made in between Mad Max: Fury Road and Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga.
Boasting one of the most intriguing premises of recent memory, the movie follows a British narratologist – someone who studies stories – named Alithea (Oscar-winner Tilda Swinton).
In Istanbul for a conference, she purchases an antique bottle at a market and, upon taking it back to her hotel room, she discovers that it contains a genie (Idris Elba).
Delighted to be freed from the bottle, the genie offers Alithea three wishes. In response though, Alithea says she is content with her life and does not need three wishes. She is also wary of the genie as most stories about them are cautionary tales.
To help put her mind at ease, the genie begins recounting his life story to Alithea. The movie jumps between Alithea and the genie’s conversations in the hotel room to flashbacks throughout the genie’s 3,000 years on Earth, leading to how he became trapped in the bottle.
Essentially Miller’s blank cheque movie after the runaway success of Oscar Best Picture nominee Mad Max: Fury Road, Three Thousand Years of Longing was made with a $60 million budget and it’s all up there on the screen. The film looks incredible, particularly the colourful and vibrant flashback sequences which inventively breeze through the genie’s experiences across thousands of years of history.
On top of this, Elba and Swinton have great chemistry and make for incredibly likeable protagonists, with the movie also serving as an exploration of the nature of storytelling, romance and how life has changed throughout the ages.
Despite all these praiseworthy elements though, the movie was a box office flop, only grossing $20 million, perhaps because its ambitious, genre-bending and emotional story was difficult to sum up in its marketing. That said, it did earn generally decent write-ups from critics.
Three Thousand Years of Longing is airing on TV tonight on Film4 at 11.30pm. It should also be available to stream on Channel 4’s website after it airs.
Here are the other movies airing on TV tonight:
Robin Hood – ITV4 – 8.05pm
Ridley Scott and Russell Crowe’s gritty Robin Hood reimagining.
Luther: Never Too Much – Sky Arts – 9pm
The acclaimed new music documentary about American soul and R&B singer Luther Vandross.
Notting Hill – Film4 – 9pm
The classic rom-com about a Hollywood actress (Julia Roberts) who falls in love with an ordinary bookseller (Hugh Grant) in London.
Meet the Fockers – E4 – 9pm
Barbra Streisand and Dustin Hoffman join the cast of this follow-up to the hilarious Meet the Parents starring Ben Stiller and Robert De Niro.
Highlander – Legend Xtra – 9pm
‘There can be only one!’
The Cold Light of Day – Legend – 9pm
A not very good action thriller starring Henry Cavill, Bruce Willis and Sigourney Weaver.
Drop Dead Gorgeous – Comedy Central – 11pm
Amy Adams, Denise Richards and Kirsten Dunst star as potential pageant queens in this dark comedy mockumentary that was completely overlooked upon release in 1999 but has since generated a huge cult following.
Blue Jean – BBC Two (except Wales) – 11.05pm
This 2022 British’ ’80s-set drama holds an impressive 96% score on Rotten Tomatoes.
Witchfinder General – Legend Xtra – 11.15pm
A very disturbing ’60s horror thriller starring the great Vincent Price as a self-appointed witch-hunter.
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- New Netflix series remake of classic movie gets exciting update from star
