The Odyssey (Christopher Nolan, 2026)

[Never Cursed]

Yeah, she doesn't want any of the association with Nolan's adaptation. It's a really harsh piece, but in spite of some of my doubts about her framing I can't really argue against it till I see the movie.

[hearthesilence]

Regardless of whether one agrees with her take (I haven't seen the film or read her translation), I can't blame her for publishing a harshly critical review. As I shared upthread, her work has clearly benefitted financially from the movie and Nolan citing her book. But it also means her work gets strongly associated with Nolan's, and that's a common discomfort for anyone - having something you dedicated a good chunk of your life too or something that once defined your life's work suddenly consumed or permanently redefined by someone else's doing. There's not much else she can do at this point except make her views about the movie very clear.

[ballmouse]

Reading about halfway through and the last few sentences, I got the impression that she was sort of resigned to the fact that she didn't like the movie but that she (especially) was not the target audience. You don't make a Hollywood blockbuster targeted to professors specializing in ancient Greek stories. You make one targeted to the Hollywood blockbuster/Nolan audience. And of course, there's not a whole lot of overlap. And I personally couldn't tell what her cinema knowledge was. She seemed to keep referencing how the film differed from the source material. Which is fine, but it's not a great piece of film criticism. Wasn't it Stephen King who famously hated Kubrick's film adaptation?

I guess I would have been more surprised if she loved it.

[Noiretirc]

But what would Homer think of Wilson?

[Brian C]

It reminds me a lot of the chorus of baseball fans that pop up whenever a new baseball fan is made. "Shoeless Joe was a lefty!" Ok buddy but it's a movie, the story doesn't really hinge on what side of the plate the guy is batting from. (Full disclosure that as a baseball fan, I am naturally sympathetic to a lot of these kinds of complaints.)

Or when Neil deGrasse Tyson insists on pointing out how every space movie gets the physics wrong. Cool but we're not using this as a NASA training film, so calm down.

Subject matter experts are always unhappy with movies that deal with their field. So are people who loved the books the movies are based on. Unfortunately, Wilson is both in this case, and it shows in this piece all too well.

[spectre]

But what would Homer think of Wilson?

Amid the "debates" (if one could be so charitable) over the casting of Nolan's film – in which I saw someone remark that Homer would be "rolling in his grave" at Nolan's adaptation – I joked that Homer might well see the slightest misrepresentation of the gods or perhaps the very existence of cinema itself as a far bigger blasphemy than any given interpretation of these stories. But this is all ridiculous of course, given we can't even know for sure whether any such person existed, nor whether he would (or could) have an opinion on Wilson's plain-English 21st-century translation vs George Chapman's 17th-century translation or any other. I don't see any obvious reason to prefer one over the over from any kind of fundamentalist perspective.

Whatever one's view of Wilson's translation, it's fair to say that it's an attempt to capture the spirit of the work and at least a studied interpretation of its themes, whereas it sounds (at least from this and other reviews; I'm yet to watch the film myself, though have seen enough Nolan to have an idea of how this is going to be) like Nolan is trying to throw in a bit of everything and losing coherence in the process. Her piece reads to me at least that she's criticising the film on cinematic grounds, not for its lack of fidelity to her vision of the poem or anything similarly reductive.

[Zot!]

I mean people were complaining that Nolan was not faithful enough to Batman, so really that's the level of discourse nowadays. I'm more concerned that Nolan is somehow regarded as a radical political filmmaker, because that feels a pretty low bar to satisfy nowadays from both sides of the popular political regurgitation.

[Roger Ryan]

…writing dialogue is not one of Nolan’s talents. The language is relentlessly expository, humourless and flat. Attempts at vigorous speech – ‘My dad’s coming home’ or ‘Let’s get off this fucking beach’ – sit uncomfortably next to grandiose meditations: ‘Yes, my queen. The breaking of Zeus’ law, spreading like plague. Our age of bronze is collapsing, and maybe he couldn’t bear to see the ruins of what he’d done. Anywhere. Least of all, his home.’

In this regard, Nolan’s approach is reminiscent of how Scorsese handled the dialogue/characterization in The Last Temptation of Christ - modern day personages who routinely appear to be quoting ancient texts to express themselves. It’s a choice and can make the material more immediately relatable to a general audience. It can also help relieve some of the pretentiousness of adapting scripture or an epic poem for a multiplex. Specifically, my reaction when viewing the film was “My dad’s coming home” is a clunker; “Let’s get off this fucking beach” plays just fine!

I think Nolan’s film works best, not as a literary adaptation, but as an action adventure film spiced up with a little philosophy.

[JSC]

With The Last Temptation of Christ they were adapting Nikos Kazantzakis' novel, which already used modern or
semi-modern language (also, Paul Schrader was the screenwriter ). Perhaps 300 might be a better comparison
as it is essentially a large scale action adventure film (in this case with the Persian wars as a backdrop).

[denti alligator]

It reminds me a lot of the chorus of baseball fans that pop up whenever a new baseball fan is made. "Shoeless Joe was a lefty!" Ok buddy but it's a movie, the story doesn't really hinge on what side of the plate the guy is batting from. (Full disclosure that as a baseball fan, I am naturally sympathetic to a lot of these kinds of complaints.)

Or when Neil deGrasse Tyson insists on pointing out how every space movie gets the physics wrong. Cool but we're not using this as a NASA training film, so calm down.

Subject matter experts are always unhappy with movies that deal with their field. So are people who loved the books the movies are based on. Unfortunately, Wilson is both in this case, and it shows in this piece all too well.

But her criticisms have little to do with accuracy or fidelity but with the failure of the film to engage with the moral complexity of the poem, and with its failure to give the characters the dialogue and scenes needed to reveal their complexity. It's a far more nuanced critique.

[Guido]

In this regard, Nolan’s approach is reminiscent of how Scorsese handled the dialogue/characterization in The Last Temptation of Christ - modern day personages who routinely appear to be quoting ancient texts to express themselves

I would have loved to see a gruff old John Lurie on Odysseus's ship

Many thanks again to Mr. Sausage for their brilliant post; as someone who went in with minimal knowledge of Greek mythology (save for Julian Jaynes's bonkers reading of Homer's epics in *The Origin of Consciousness*), it was hugely illuminating.

The film itself didn't do much for me. I can appreciate the surface pleasures of Nolan's films, but even his most experimental tendencies, particularly around narrative structure, have always struck me as fussy window dressing. It doesn't help that I find his style (I won't even touch on his writing) completely haphazard and perfunctory — especially apparent here in the first hour, where the sloppiness of the editing was just baffling to me. There's more imagination, poetry, spatial coherence, and sheer cinematic magic in 30 seconds of a King Hu film than the entirety of what I saw here.

And yeah — "Nostos: The Return" was a wonderful tonic.

[John Cope]

An elegy for the end of (a) civilization that could not be more timely and relevant. Indeed, if anything, I perceive this to be that which must have motivated Nolan to take on a project this vast and epochal, this much the cultural foundation stone. I was also simply awed by what it must have taken to make this at this level of accomplishment. He spares no expense and cuts no corners; the money, as they say, is onscreen., None of this would matter if the artistry was not there as well but thankfully it is there in abundance even if Nolan's particular take on this may require some adjustment to appreciate. I have also just recently and finally finished watching the 1968 Franco Rossi TV series adaptation and I continue to be amazed how every version of this takes certain liberties with it if only in terms of what gets emphasized and what gets left out (and they all leave something out, even in the extended versions). Nolan, for instance, really prioritizes the pin on the cloak of Odysseus, given to him by Penelope and worn as a constant reminder of their love bond, of what he fights and lives for.

The compression here has the perhaps unavoidable effect of being exhausting, but it is just as often exhilarating with every major set piece sequence made visceral and incredibly powerful. And, of course, Nolan's trademark swirling and looping time structure technique is here and accounted for but is also wisely and appropriately deployed in this instance, a well considered fit for this material and its emphasis upon reverie and reflection within the action and between the lines of the action spectacle (the boldest moments of reflection here, as in the scenes between Odysseus and Athena and Odysseus and Calypso, are among my favorites). This technique is not exactly peak Roeg or Malick level prismatic collage but it is still quietly thrilling to see a major release structured like this in such a free flowing way and with such little concern over our immediate comprehension. Nolan can't help but heavily load up on the expository dialogue at first and it is a bit overwhelming and dense to a fault (I can't imagine how someone entirely unfamiliar with all this would receive it) but really no one expected this to be elegant per se and so it is a real pleasant surprise when it seems to mature and develop into that in its later stages. As bluntly direct as some of this can be much is also only implied and is expressed purely through function (e.g. the bravura cyclops scene with an almost mute Polyphemus). This also leads to some of the most inspired bits here (e.g. the choice to mute the sirens' song for us).

As for Noan's handling of the gods, which I initially thought might be a contentious element, he displays a firm grasp on that portrayal. While he allows for a more psychologically modern interpretation of the encounter with the gods as an almost PTSD manifestation he also indicates clearly that Odysseus' response was first to a perceived violation of Zeus's established law (and he makes sure to keep constant allusions to hospitality throughout which could not be more critical), establishing then a comprehensive vision of reality in which the gods are interwoven as permanent fixtures. Odysseus's purported resistance to the gods is another modern notion but it is also a more serious incorporation of a contemporary consideration than those that feature in Ridley Scott's historical work and come off for all their insistence as mere curiosities; Nolan sees it instead as a kind of responsibility, a taking up of an existential, even metaphysical challenge while anachronistic elements suggest a broader universality. Within an all-around strong and sound cast, Damon's sensitive performance is particularly noteworthy, pointing up the human angle in a brutal world. Fantastic final shot too that sums it all up.

I really do wonder how comprehensible some of this is to those not already familiar with it or whether that even matters. Best example I can think of is the whole way in which the Agamemnon/Clytemnestra thing is handled, basically in brief with the barest glimpses of hints; obviously someone could just look this up but they're not likely to do that in the middle of the movie (let's hope). I am glad he didn't feel obliged to spell it out, but it does provide a further thematic development upon what Nolan is focusing on here which is sacrificial cost so I don't like to think that it's missed or too obscure. This is also what motivates and justifies the ending being altered to exile; someone has to pay the price, specifically someone conscious of a price needing to be paid. In that sense then, and more subtly, Damon's Odysseus is contrasted with Bernthal's more thuggish Menelaus and specifically the way he treats Helen as property rather than prize. Similarly, Page's casting is perfect as that character and those scenes function thematically, emphasizing a vulnerable figure who is directly affected by Odysseus' deceptions. Nolan shows a real facility in aligning actors with characters, an understanding of actor as character.

I should say, too, that I see some people bemoaning the Athena and Calypso scenes as BORING but, as I've said elsewhere, those were among my own favorite scenes of the whole film. Without those interspersed throughout and leading us up to the pivotal moment of reflection between Odysseus and Penelope (so beautifully staged with Hathaway barely visible behind that latticework screen) we would have virtually nothing but spectacle (or suitors' antics). Besides, if people hate those scenes then they would really hate versions of this that are more literal and faithful to the source. But again the reflective structure is not only intrinsic but critically essential; it has to be there in some form; it would be a wholly different boys' adventure tale without it (similar to how Jane Eyre in most adaptations comes off as a lousy Harlequin romance protype without the inclusion of the language of the text to distinguish it). For me, what I especially like about the Calypso scenes in particular is the way in which they recall the early scenes of Witt talking about his mother in The Thin Red Line ("I was afraid to touch the death I seen in her. I couldn't find nothing beautiful or uplifting about her going back to God."); though once again what is emphasized in Nolan's version of Homer is very human regret and a desire for self-annihilation as a consequence rather than a willful forgetting put at the service of a longing for the divine (here Malick is much more metaphysically explicit and aware). Meanwhile, the end of civilization the film heralds is appropriately mixed, confused, heralding the emergence of something else; it is both negative and positive in connotative effect and in reality; but it also compels an inquiry into what constitutes a civilization as it provides the sign of their ever shifting and cyclical nature.