I’ll admit to being unimpressed by every single trailer for The Odyssey. The multitude of marketing left me exhausted at the idea of this film. It just looked like Oppenheimer and The Dark Knight had a Greek Nolan baby, and neither of those films are at the top of my favorite Nolan films. I wasn’t even excited for this film until word of mouth said it was living up to the hype. So I went. I didn’t regret it.
Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of this Greek mythology follows both father and son, Odysseus and Telemachus, as the film unfolds. From Odysseus’s perspective, he tries to remember how he ended up with nymph Calypso and tells his tale as he remembers it. The Trojan War. Taking the long way home. The terrifying cyclops Polyphemus and how Odysseus blinding the creature so they could escape caused the creature’s father, Poseidon, to punish them. Two of their ships are destroyed by giant cannibals. Goddess Circe turns the men into pigs when they eat her food and Odysseus has to save them. They even speak to the dead, which is when Odysseus learns how much of their humanity and society the Trojan war destroyed.
Telemachus seeks to find the truth about his missing father before one of his mother, Penelope is forced to marry one of the suitors who have camped out at Ithaca for so many years. It isn’t until Odysseus escapes Calypso’s island and returns home that the final act takes place. If you’ve read the myth, you know the rest. If you haven’t, I’ll let you watch it unfold without spoilers.
While Nolan simplifies some aspects of the Greek myth, he does so because he wants to concentrate on how much guilt Odysseus carries over coming up with the idea of the horse. The rage exhibited when the men entered the walls of Troy decimated a city and destroyed its people. There is much talk of the rules of Zeus, on treating others as you would want to be treated, throughout the movie. This aligns with themes of guilt over the war and how their actions ruined a society.
Agamemnon used the kidnapping of Helen, his brother Menelaus’s wife, to the city of Troy as a reason to attack the city. If the film, he is portrayed as a terrifying commander who wants nothing but revenge of the people of Troy in his brother’s name. He is all but faceless, rarely seen without his helmet. This so adeptly shows what kind of person it takes to decimate a city that when Agamemnon gets what is coming to him, as many do in Greek mythology, it’s a small justice that sadly won’t change how the tragic events unfolded.
Nolan’s use of practical effects when it came to Polyphemus is truly something out of a horror movie. The same goes for the scene where Circe turns the men into pigs as her hands mold their faces like clay. Honestly, Mr. Nolan, make a horror movie. It would be terrifying. and I’d love it.
Tom Holland finally gives us an adult performance even though he plays a younger character. Matt Damon sells the story of Odysseus so well that we’re almost sad it had to end. The real standouts, though, were Jon Bernthal and Anne Hathaway. Bernthal’s part only has a couple of scenes, but he commands them. Hathaway gives a strong, heartbreaking performance as the grieving yet hopeful wife who holds the seat that belongs to her husband even as her many suitors demand she choose one of them. If she’s not in the Oscar race come March, it’ll be the worst snub in recent memory.
My only real complaint is some of the more modern dialogue (Dad! Or I’m okay) took me out of the action a bit, right out of Ancient Greece and into modern day. Why not father or I’m alright? Higher diction for an elevated movie. Really, it’s such a small complaint that I’m not sure why I’m mentioning it. but there it is.
The genuine epic scale of this film left me blown away. While Oppenheimer is a film I’ll likely never watch again for it’s too depressing, The Odyssey is one I’ll probably revisit just for the horror elements and the story. This is what we want, Hollywood. Films made with love by the filmmakers.
4.5 out of 5 stars. Might be 5 later when I go see it again.
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Becky Tyler Art and Photography 
I’ll admit to being unimpressed by every single trailer for The Odyssey. The multitude of marketing left me exhausted at the idea of this film. It just looked like Oppenheimer and The Dark Knight had a Greek Nolan baby, and neither of those films are at the top of my favorite Nolan films. I wasn’t even excited for this film until word of mouth said it was living up to the hype. So I went. I didn’t regret it.
Christopher Nolan’s adaptation of this Greek mythology follows both father and son, Odysseus and Telemachus, as the film unfolds. From Odysseus’s perspective, he tries to remember how he ended up with nymph Calypso and tells his tale as he remembers it. The Trojan War. Taking the long way home. The terrifying cyclops Polyphemus and how Odysseus blinding the creature so they could escape caused the creature’s father, Poseidon, to punish them. Two of their ships are destroyed by giant cannibals. Goddess Circe turns the men into pigs when they eat her food and Odysseus has to save them. They even speak to the dead, which is when Odysseus learns how much of their humanity and society the Trojan war destroyed.
Telemachus seeks to find the truth about his missing father before one of his mother, Penelope is forced to marry one of the suitors who have camped out at Ithaca for so many years. It isn’t until Odysseus escapes Calypso’s island and returns home that the final act takes place. If you’ve read the myth, you know the rest. If you haven’t, I’ll let you watch it unfold without spoilers.
While Nolan simplifies some aspects of the Greek myth, he does so because he wants to concentrate on how much guilt Odysseus carries over coming up with the idea of the horse. The rage exhibited when the men entered the walls of Troy decimated a city and destroyed its people. There is much talk of the rules of Zeus, on treating others as you would want to be treated, throughout the movie. This aligns with themes of guilt over the war and how their actions ruined a society.
Agamemnon used the kidnapping of Helen, his brother Menelaus’s wife, to the city of Troy as a reason to attack the city. If the film, he is portrayed as a terrifying commander who wants nothing but revenge of the people of Troy in his brother’s name. He is all but faceless, rarely seen without his helmet. This so adeptly shows what kind of person it takes to decimate a city that when Agamemnon gets what is coming to him, as many do in Greek mythology, it’s a small justice that sadly won’t change how the tragic events unfolded.
Nolan’s use of practical effects when it came to Polyphemus is truly something out of a horror movie. The same goes for the scene where Circe turns the men into pigs as her hands mold their faces like clay. Honestly, Mr. Nolan, make a horror movie. It would be terrifying. and I’d love it.
Tom Holland finally gives us an adult performance even though he plays a younger character. Matt Damon sells the story of Odysseus so well that we’re almost sad it had to end. The real standouts, though, were Jon Bernthal and Anne Hathaway. Bernthal’s part only has a couple of scenes, but he commands them. Hathaway gives a strong, heartbreaking performance as the grieving yet hopeful wife who holds the seat that belongs to her husband even as her many suitors demand she choose one of them. If she’s not in the Oscar race come March, it’ll be the worst snub in recent memory.
My only real complaint is some of the more modern dialogue (Dad! Or I’m okay) took me out of the action a bit, right out of Ancient Greece and into modern day. Why not father or I’m alright? Higher diction for an elevated movie. Really, it’s such a small complaint that I’m not sure why I’m mentioning it. but there it is.
The genuine epic scale of this film left me blown away. While Oppenheimer is a film I’ll likely never watch again for it’s too depressing, The Odyssey is one I’ll probably revisit just for the horror elements and the story. This is what we want, Hollywood. Films made with love by the filmmakers.
4.5 out of 5 stars. Might be 5 later when I go see it again.
Discover more from Becky Tyler Art and Photography
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