There are two things I admire about Christopher Nolan.  First, he’s never made the same movie twice (outside of the Batman trilogy).  He’s Kubrick-ian in that way, setting out to make the best movie in every genre he visits.  Second, he relishes large-scale storytelling.  Like his peer Denis Villeneuve, he loves painting on the biggest canvas possible.  Taken together, it makes perfect sense that Nolan would tackle The Odyssey, an epic tale in a genre he hadn’t conquered yet.  That said, the movie contains all of the narrative and stylistic touches you’d expect from a Nolan film, right down to the “what did he say?” moments of dialog dialog.

Like many of Nolan’s films, The Odyssey deals with three of his favorite themes: time, perception and memory.  Time-wise, the story of Odysseus (Matt Damon) spans roughly eighteen years, from when he left Ithaca to wage war at Troy until his belated return.  How he and others perceive his victory is a crucial aspect of Nolan’s interpretation of events.  Finally, there’s the matter of Odysseus’ memory, which gradually returns and forces him to come to terms with what he did to win the war that made him famous.

Like the source poem, the movie begins in the middle, with Odysseus’s whereabouts unknown since the conclusion of the Trojan war.  His absence–or death–has left his wife Penelope (Anne Hathaway) and son Telemachus (Tom Holland) vulnerable.  Penelope can’t raise an army to defend the city from an attack by “sea people”.  (The movie never clarifies who those people are.)  Telemachus can’t become king because he has no support from the city’s elders, who prefer Penelope choose a husband from dozens of suitors.

The suitors are an opportunistic lot and have been hanging out at the castle every night, (im)patiently waiting for Penelope to make her choice once she finishes her shroud.  However, she’s been secretly undoing her work every night, prolonging the wait for eight years.

Some of the men waiting for Penelope are unsavory characters, including the conniving Antinous (Robert Pattison) and the brutish Polybus (Corey Hawkins), both of which constantly goad Telemachus into fighting them.  If he does, they can kill him while defending themselves without consequence, which would also remove him as an obstacle in their way to the throne.

Like his mother, Telemachus is frustrated with the situation he finds himself in.  Even though he’s never met him, he’s compelled to defend his father’s honor.  Telemachus is counseled by the semi-blind Eumaeus (John Leguizamo), a pig farmer on the family property, who says that Odysseus was a great man and is still alive.  But Eumaeus’ loyalty to his father doesn’t help much, because the suitors can kill him as well for interfering.

Before long, the waiting and taunts of the jackasses in his house drive Telemachus to leave home in search of news of his father. He meets Menelaus (Jon Bernthal) in Sparta because his brother Agamemnon (Bennie Safdie) was Odysseus’ commander at Troy.  Menelaus confirms that the songs sung of Odysseus’ heroism are true, but he doesn’t know what happened to his father, either.

Menelaus also inadvertently helps Telemachus understand the unforeseen consequences of war.  Menelaus’s wife Helen (Lupita Nyong’o), whose affair was a pretext for the war, is permanently scarred from that conflict.  Her sister, Clytemnestra (also Nyong’o), killed Agamemnon upon his return for sacrificing their daughter to Poseidon.  The message there is that any manner of bad fortune could have befallen Odysseus.

Like his son, Odysseus has also been searching for answers, albeit begrudgingly.  He spends his days eating Lotus flowers and gazing upon the beautiful Calypso (Charlize Theron), who rescued him from the sea and healed his body.  Unfortunately, the years he spent self-medicating have robbed Odysseus of his memory.  For her part, Calypso doesn’t want him to remember who he was before he drifted to her shore, preferring that the two live together forever in her beachfront paradise.  (Not a lot of arm-twisting needed there.)  When Odysseus presses her as to his life before she found him, she tells him that he chose not to remember.

When Odysseus stops chomping on flowers, his former life comes back to him.  All of the signature moments one remembers about The Odyssey are faithfully depicted in the movie, including the giant cyclops, the crafty witch Circe (Samantha Morton), a meet-up in Hades and a tragic prophecy from Tiresias (James Remar), the Sirens and the Scylla and the Charybdis (thank you, Sting).

The crux of the movie is when Odysseus realizes why he wanted to forget all of his “heroic” deeds, primarily from guilt over all of the deaths he’s responsible for.  Full of regret, Odysseus finally decides to keep his promise to his long-suffering wife and return home, and then protect his son from being harmed by scheming suitors.  To Ithaca, with haste!  (Well, by raft, anyway.)

Recommendation

Christopher Nolan must have a direct line to the future, because it’s been a while since we’ve had a good movie featuring swords, leather armor and helmets with horsehair plumes.  Gladiator (2000) came out twenty-six years ago and nothing has seriously challenged it since.  Troy (2004), a Clash of the Titans remake (2010) and The Immortals (2011) came out in its wake, but they mostly suffered from what has defined this genre for decades: overwrought performances and cheesy special effects.

For his version of The Odyssey, Nolan opted for a grounded and serious approach to the material that fully acknowledges its fantastical elements.  On the one hand, the battle scenes are very impressive, full of hacking, slashing, screaming and clanging swords.  For the supernatural stuff, Nolan’s emphasis on using practical effects makes it all look realistic.  It’s the same thing Nolan did with his Batman trilogy, for example, where his version of the Batmobile was practical instead of stylish and still was impressive because of how Nolan used it.

The other way Nolan puts his stamp on the story is how he redefines Odysseus.  Nolan turns him into another one of his protagonists who thinks he’s a great man, only to realize that he’s changed his world for the worse.  As such, Odysseus is haunted by his “trick” with the wooden horse, the cost paid by his men and the Trojans for its success and how it will inspire rulers to pursue the “might makes right” approach to diplomacy in the future.  Nolan has an affinity for characters who regret the decisions they’ve made, and he adds Odysseus to his Club of Regret.  Odysseus has always been a complex character, but Nolan makes him introspective as well.

Nolan cast his film like a sword-and-sandal film from the Golden Age of Hollywood.  There’s nary a Greek in sight; and the closest we get is Bennie Safdie’s Agamemnon.  Caucasians occupy all of the principal roles and everyone uses American English.  Fortunately, having everyone speaking modern vernacular with American accents wasn’t jarring at all.  There were moments when Nolan’s trademarked sound design drowned out some dialog, but that’s to be expected.

All of the lead performances are incredible.  Matt Damon, who’s proven himself as a thinking man’s action hero with the Jason Bourne movies, is a perfect match for the fierce, mercurial and surprisingly pensive Odysseus  His closing monologue about his responsibility for the decline of civilization is so poignantly delivered that it reminded me how overlooked he is as a dramatic actor.  Tom Holland, who is either blessed or cursed to forever look eighteen, is fine as the boy-man searching for his father.  Robert Pattinson is a scene-stealing wonder as the creepy Antinous.  Samantha Morton’s Circe is a witch of nightmares, non-threatening in appearance but stealthily dangerous.  Anne Hathaway gives a typical “Anne Hathaway performance” as Penelope, a bit much at times but never overwhelming.

Nolan’s love of stunt casting is a mixed bag here.  On the plus side are John Leguizamo’s pig farmer, Jon Bernthal’s Menelaus and Charlize Theron as Calypso.  (She would easily convince any man to run away with her to a deserted island.)  Casting Lupita Nyong’o as Helen was a clever way to depict a singular beauty that incited men to war.  I didn’t buy Elliot Page as Sinon, because he’s too slight to be a soldier.  Zendaya also looks conspicuous as a character whose identity isn’t confirmed until late.  Mia Goth’s part doesn’t amount to much.  I chuckled whenever Travis Scott showed up to drop some knowledge.

In terms of spectacle, Nolan relentlessly stages one incredible set piece after another.  The scenes with Trojan Horse and the sacking of the city are both worth the price of admission for how realistically they’re staged.  The physical look of this world is so authentic and lived-in that I never doubted the time and place, which is a rarity for this genre.  (God help the CGI-addled historical blockbuster that follows this one.)  While Nolan does use computer VFX, his ability to seamlessly meld them with live actors and physical locations is unparalleled.  Lastly, Nolan’s screenplay, which regularly switches between the past and present, flows so seamlessly that my attention never wavered over the movie’s almost three hour runtime.

In his telling of The Odyssey, writer-director Christopher Nolan refashions an ancient and universal story into one of the most vibrant action movies in recent memory.  Despite some minor flaws, the movie is a thrilling, soul-searching adventure like no other.  Highly recommended.

Analysis

The epic poem the Odyssey roughly dates back almost three thousand years ago.  Elements of the saga have become ingrained in popular culture, to the point where everyone knows what “Trojan Horse” and “rock and a hard place” signify.  So how does Christopher Nolan make this well-known tale feel so exciting and new?

Familiar, but not that familiar

The number of adaptations of the Odyssey are surprisingly few in number.  The last one I recall is the 1997 miniseries that aired on NBC.  Several recent films have loosely adapted the story for a contemporary adaptation, including O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000) and Cold Mountain (2003).  The last faithful movie adaptation came out in 1954 and starred Kirk Douglas.  The story of Odysseus’s long journey home is one that most people know but haven’t seen.  The time was right for Nolan to give us a fresh take on the old tale.

Tragicomically Greek

Until Nolan came along, most movies based upon Greek mythology are guilty pleasures.  For example, The Clash of the Titans (1981) has great stop-motion effects from Ray Harryhausen, but the acting is either wooden or campy.  Even worse is the inclusion of Bubo the Owl, a robotic creature that was added to the story to increase its appeal to children.

The Brad Pitt vehicle Troy (2004) works only as manly testosterone-fueled trash.  Director Wolfgang Peterson stages several exciting action sequences and gets a few respectable performances from the cast, principally from Eric Bana and Peter O’Toole, but he tries to have it both ways.  It’s a sweaty beefcake movie that gets itself twisted in knots trying to acknowledge the Gods’ influence on Achilles while also rationalizing his fighting prowess as being due to a deadly martial arts move that nobody can defend.

300 (2006) and 300: Rise of an Empire (2014) are true to their graphic novel origins, in that they’re loosely based upon historical fact but exist as superhero movies set in ancient Greece.  They’re red meat comic book stories, full of ultraviolence and chest-thumping.

I haven’t seen the remake of The Clash of the Titans (2010) or The Immortals (2011), but from the trailers they look like more of the same.

Seriously Greek

Nolan is the only filmmaker in my lifetime who has approached The Odyssey respectfully.  Instead of depicting Odysseus as an oily, muscle-bound superhero, Nolan presents him as a strong, battle-hardened man who happens to be deadly accurate with a bow and arrow.  The movie does include a few beefcake shots of Damon, who looks impossibly chiseled despite having lived on a deserted island for eight years, but keeps him covered in armor and robes otherwise.

When it comes to Odysseus’ adventures, Nolan eschews a fantastical approach for one that’s realistic.  The Trojan Horse is an actual prop that is pulled along by extras.  Odysseus’ ship was an actual ship.  The city of Troy was recreated as an enormous set.  The army of the dead who chase Odysseus out of Hades looks like hundreds of extras.  Nolan’s preference for practical effects over CGI plays a huge role in convincing us that what we see is real.

Nolan also depicts the monsters and magical beings as realistically as possible.  The giant cyclops was performed by a huge puppet to effectively convey its size.  The giant armored men were portrayed by men who were seven feet tall.  Circe is a kindly little old lady.  Nolan doesn’t let us see the Sirens up close, cleverly acknowledging that nobody ever did.

The only times when Nolan’s practical approach underwhelms is with the Scylla and Charybdis.  Charybdis looks like a CGI whirlpool, while Scylla looks like a CGI monster.  Thankfully, the performances and Nolan’s taut direction help us look past the shortcomings in those scenes.  Nolan’s mature approach to the Odyssey was so convincing that the movie looks like a window into the past.

A complex hero for our times

Nolan makes Odysseus more than a straightforward action hero.  Nolan presents him as a decent person with a moral code who is also stubborn and egoistical.  He believes his choices are always correct, even though they often have disastrous consequences.  While this is true to the Odyssey, Nolan ensures that we see how much Odysseus’ bad decision-making weighs on him.

Odysseus is also loyal to a fault, agreeing to fight in a war he doesn’t believe in, with full knowledge that he’ll be gone for years and may never return.  He’s a soldier who knows he must fight when ordered to do so, regardless of his opinion of the objective.  His is not to question why, but to do or die.

When it comes to Odysseus’ “trick”, Nolan shows us the heavy costs associated with it.  And when it does, Nolan doesn’t hold back in shoving the horrific outcome in our faces.  Odysseus tells Calypso that the brutality the Greek soldiers unleashed on the citizens of Troy was the result of ten years of frustration, and Nolan gives us exactly that in extended sequences of carnage..

Nolan’s influence on the Odyssey is most apparent in how he transforms Odysseus into a man who regrets his heroism when he sees it within a larger context.  Nolan’s Odysseus is still the man who helped conquer Troy, defeated the giant cyclops, outwitted the witch Circe, survived the sirens, etc.  However, those feats give Odysseus insight into his place in the world, something he’d never allowed himself to have.  Odysseus’ adventures force him to understand his shortcomings and how he is directly responsible for many tragic outcomes.  Everywhere Odysseus goes, death follows.  He’s a successful military man, but his body count is astronomical.  In the end, Odysseus realizes that he’s been a useful tool for warmongers, men who will bring about the destruction of his world.

A grounded fantasy

Nolan wisely embraces The Odyssey’s fantastical elements, but he depicts them in the most realistic way possible.  The giant cyclops looks like a human being who doesn’t wear clothes because he can’t make them and can’t have someone make him a loincloth.  Circe looks like a kindly middle-aged peasant woman.  The armored giants are fearsome even though they’re only  two feet taller than Odysseus and his men.  The legion of soldiers from Hades looks like a huge group of men who’ve crawled up through the earth.  The sirens are only seen from a distance, which is logical.  The Charybdis is a huge whirlpool.  The movie’s weak spot is the Scylla, which is seen only briefly and it isn’t very convincing.

The acting is also amazingly grounded for this genre, which came to be defined by over the top performances.  Every actor takes their role seriously and delivers a performance that would feel right at home if the events were set in modern times.  Even Robert Pattinson’s Antinous, the movie’s obvious villain, is more slimy than hammy.

Another decision by Nolan that keeps everything grounded is having all of the actors speak modern dialog using American accents.  He doesn’t want the pseudo-classical affectations routinely used by this genre to be a barrier between the actors’ performances and the audience.  This also means that Damon and Hathaway don’t have to try to sound British, while Pattinson and Holland’s convincing American accents are fully utilized.

An analogy for modern times

While watching The Odyssey, it’s clear that Nolan didn’t decide to make his movie just because he believed he would make the greatest Greek mythology movie ever made.  He sees the story of Odysseus as a cautionary tale in the same way that Oppenheimer was.  In both films, the protagonist leaves the world in a worse place than it had been before his great accomplishments.  Both men come to realize what they’ve done after it’s too late to change anything that will inspire others in the future.  The cat’s out of the bag, the jeanie is out of the bottle, and so on.

Although Tenet doesn’t have a similarly troubled protagonist, its story is about a future waging war with the past over the effects of a looming ecological disaster.  Taken together with Oppenheimer and The Odyssey, Nolan is warning us to take a hard look at our world and all of the terrible things happening in it and see who’s responsible.  While he doesn’t call for an all-out revolution against the rich and the powerful, Nolan wants us to do something about it before it’s too late.

When viewed in that light, Nolan’s The Odyssey becomes an indictment of American exceptionalism–or British exceptionalism, if you choose.  All of the characters in the movie have American accents.  The inciting event of the story is a forever war fought on foreign soil to resolve trade routes.  The hero resembles the typical American soldier who returns from one of those wars suffering from PTSD, and he turns to drugs to numb the pain over what he’s seen and done.  The leaders of the armed forces are thuggish brutes (Menelaus and Agamemnon).  Many of the characters who have tragic ends are either trans (Sinon) or People of Color (Helen/Clytemnestra, Zendaya’s character).