Christian Bale and Oscar Isaac watch Constantinople burn in The Promise trailer

It’s impossible to talk about World War II without discussing the Holocaust. But World War I—itself not short on unimaginable atrocities—also had its own incident of race-based mass extermination. And what better filmmaker to bring those horrors to our pampered Western eyes than Terry George, the guy who directed Hotel Rwanda?

The Armenian Genocide of 1915—in which the Ottoman Empire systematically killed 1.5 million of its own citizens—serves as the backdrop to a love triangle in George’s newest film, The Promise, which he co-wrote with Robin Swicord (The Curious Case Of Benjamin Button). Oscar Isaac plays a medical student who falls in love with a fellow Armenian (The Walk’s Charlotte le Bon) after she travels to Constantinople with an American photojournalist (Christian Bale). Things get complicated. And then they get violent. And then they probably get very depressing, considering what history tells us happened in those last days of the Ottoman Empire.

We have been assured that The Promise will be in theaters at some point in 2016.