Fans of Tilda Swinton and Idris Elba will find their wishes lavishly granted in George Miller’s delirious fable about a lovelorn djinn.

Fussy loner Alithea Binnie is a narratologist: an academic who studies stories. Visiting Istanbul for a conference, she buys an interesting old glass bottle in the Grand Bazaar. When she later tries to clean it, she accidentally releases a cloud of coloured smoke and – you guessed it – a sexy djinn, who offers to grant her three wishes in exchange for his freedom. Even as she savours the djinn’s manifold tales of love and hubris, Alithea is professionally suspicious; she knows every trope and cliché, every predictable ending. So how will she use her own wishes to find a happily-ever-after for her trapped companion … and maybe even for herself?

George Miller trades in the post-apocalyptic world of Mad Max (screening as part of MIFF 70’s commemorative ‘Melbourne on Film’ strand) for the luscious, dreamy aesthetic he brought to his underrated Babe: Pig in the City and the eroticism of The Witches of Eastwick. Based on a 1994 short story by Possession author A.S. Byatt, this multilayered fantasia is visually rich – even outré – but, especially with Swinton and Elba’s discursive chemistry, also surprisingly cerebral and tender. In his idiosyncratic way, Miller is challenging what big-screen storytelling can be, to memorable and magnificent effect.

“A wish come true … Miller could find more cinema in a single hotel minibar than some contemporary directors could squeeze out of an entire galaxy far, far away.” – IndieWire