Interstellar trailer: Matthew McConaughey, Michael Caine and Anne Hathaway star in sneak peak into emotional Christopher Nolan sci-fi film

Matthew McConaughey stars as Cooper, who must seek out new worlds and save the human race

A new trailer for Christopher Nolan’s hotly anticipated sci-fi epic Interstellar has been released, confirming plot details that have only been rumours up until now.

Given the initial secrecy surrounding the film, the trailer is long, running to nearly three minutes and outlines the entire story.

Matthew McConaughey takes the lead as a character named “Cooper”, an engineer and pilot charged with travelling through space and time to find a new planet suitable for human inhabitation.

The fate of the human race rests on Cooper's shoulders as the Earth is facing a crippling food shortage.

Along with a group of other astronauts, including Anne Hathaway, the intrepid explorers will blast off into space on their mission, leaving the solar system behind.

The trailer pulls at the heartstrings with Cooper having to choose between staying with his two young children and saving humanity.

Interstellar is Nolan’s first film to be based on an original script since 2010’s Inception and has been penned by his brother Jonathan.

The plot has been inspired by the work of physicist Kip Thorne, who has researched wormholes and the possibilities of time travel.

The film also stars Jessica Chastain and Michael Caine, the latter starred as Alfred in Nolan’s The Dark Knight trilogy.

A teaser trailer was released back in December last year featuring McConaughey’s character making a hyperbolic speech about pioneers and destiny, but gave very little away about the storyline.

The trailer was uploaded yesterday and has already garnered close to 3 million views.

Interstellar will be released later this year in November.