Review from goodyk: Despite fascinating performances from Tilda Swinton and Idris Elba, along with inventive, near-visionary visuals, “Three Thousand Years of Longing” winds up feeling a little incomplete.
” creates inventive, often stunning visuals, and that is indeed the case with “Three Thousand Years of Longing,” his latest effort,which he squeezed in between making “Fury Road” and its sequel, the upcoming “Furiosa.” Some of the images are practically hallucinatory they’re so over-the-top.
Sometimes Swinton and Elba seem like they’re in different movies, even when they are talking to each other, which is fairly often. But they’re such fascinating performers it’s worth it just to see where things go.The acting is great. The storyline, less so Alithea travels to Istanbul for a conference, where she is a featured speaker. Things go awry when she sees visions of a strange man, apparently something that’s been happening to her lately. In a bazaar she finds a bottle, cleans it up and releases the djinn, who emerges gigantic but soon scales down to human size, eager to grant her three wishes — her heart’s desire — so he can gain his freedom.
That’s because it’s when Alithea and the djinn, which is to say Swinton and Elba, interact more fully.