******3,000 YEAR-OLD TROJAN HORSE-SIZED SPOILERS!******
On the surface, writer/producer/director Christopher Nolan (“Interstellar,” “Oppenheimer”) is a cross between Ridley Scott (“ALIEN,” “Blade Runner”) and David Lean (“Lawrence of Arabia,” “Doctor Zhivago”); sharing their love of grand spectacle and pioneering visual effects, with a knack for attracting all-star casts who earn their paychecks. With his career marked by Oscar wins and nominations, having Christopher Nolan’s name attached can attract an audience–usually those who appreciate the value of theatrical screenings over watching movies on iPads or smartphones, since most Nolan movies are uncompromisingly epic. Whether he’s telling stories about morally-gray caped crusaders or astronauts trying to save the human race, a Nolan movie is usually an event.
Odysseus and his crew set sail to sack Troy and pillage for provisions wherever they can.
Nolan now tackles Homer’s 3,000 year-old poem “The Odyssey,” which was the archetype for the ‘hero’s journey’ story still told and retold in countless forms to this day. Already going down in movie history as the first feature film shot entirely with IMAX cameras by cinematographer Hoyt van Hoytema, “The Odyssey” also includes music by Oscar-winning composer Ludwig Göranssen, and an all-star cast featuring Matt Damon, Anne Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, John Leguizamo, Charlize Theron and many others. Nolan and company give the story an epic scale and grandeur not often seen in modern movies while compressing Homer’s protracted, heavily episodic poem into a surprisingly brisk 173-minute runtime.
Odysseus’s crew stumble upon the lair of a giant cyclopian shepherd.
For full disclosure, my wife and I saw “The Odyssey” in a Dolby Atmos theater as opposed to full IMAX, since the Dolby seats were more comfortable for a nearly three-hour film. Nevertheless, the screen was large enough, even if the ratio wasn’t quite up to full IMAX height…
“The Odyssey” (2026)
Ithaca’s queen Penelope (Anne Hathaway) and her son, Telemachus (Tom Holland) have been awaiting the return of patriarch Odysseus, who left with his crew to conquer the city of Troy years earlier. Telemachus tells his mother he’s shipping out with his own crew to find the father he barely remembers, while she fends off the dozens of eager, boorish would-be suitors who’ve invaded the palace, all jockeying for power as they seek to take Odysseus’s place.
Note: The movie is a reunion of sorts for Anne Hathaway and Matt Damon, who costarred as astronauts looking for a new home planet in Nolan’s “Interstellar” 12 years ago, though their characters were not romantically involved.
Antinous (Robert Pattinson) is the front-runner of the suitors who’ve invaded the palace, and is more clever, cunning and duplicitous than the others.
Note: Robert Pattinson first came into prominence with the sparkly teen-vampire “Twilight” movies, but has come a long way since, with starring roles in “The Batman” (2022), Nolan’s “Tenet” (2020) and his recent Oscar nomination for “Marty Supreme” (2025). In addition to “The Batman Part II” (2028), he’s also costarring in “Dune, Part 3,” which will be released in December of this year.
An amnesiac Odysseus (Matt Damon) finds himself on the shores of Ogygia, with a presumed image of the goddess Athena (Zendaya) at his side–a small idol of Athena was given to him by Penelope before he set out for Troy, many years earlier. His imagined visage of Athena is based on a young woman who died before him in Troy.
Note: It was a bold choice to tell the episodic “The Odyssey” in a disjointed, time-jumping narrative, which arguably worked better for me in this film than it did for “Oppenheimer,” which felt more emotionally distant with its own jumbled narrative. Your mileage may vary.
As we see in flashbacks, and as told to Telemachus, Odysseus’s forces are stranded on the beach, and unable to breach the walls of Troy, whose citizens rightly believe the Greeks to be barbaric invaders. Odysseus and his crew then begin construction of a massive wooden horse; a ‘gift’ left behind for the people of Troy, in which they will hide as they’re unwittingly dragged within the city’s gates.
Note: The Trojan Horse of the film was a real, on-set wooden construct roughly 35 feet/10 meters in height. In addition to the prop’s greater feeling of reality, we also get a keen sense of how miserable life would’ve been inside such a vessel, as we hear Odysseus and his men gripe about being trapped with their own feces and urine for days on end. Yech...
One night, under minimal guard within the city gates, Odysseus and his atrophied men emerge from the belly of their horse and live up to their reputations as the brutal, godless “people of the sea,” who pillage wherever they land. Once the gates of Troy are breached, Agamemnon (Benny Safdie) and his forces sack the city to retrieve Helen of Troy (Lupita Nyong’o).
Note: The sacking of Troy is an amazing sequence of cinematic warfare. Despite the fantasy setting of the poem/movie, the spearing, swordplay and arrow punctures are quite jolting and intense.
Feeling remorse for the soldiers lost and the destruction they’ve caused, Odysseus and his crew make plans to head home.
Note: Shots of the slain Greek soldiers and Trojan civilian graves of Troy are powerful and evocative, giving this fantasy an appropriate gravitas. Given that the ancient city of Troy (now an archeological site in modern Türkiye) is also featured prominently in Homer’s “The Iliad,” I wonder if Nolan will ever consider tacking that 24-book (chapter) story someday…?
Agamemnon and his brother Menelaus (Jon Bernthal) return to Ithaca with their army, while Odysseus and his soldiers take a longer route, leading them to search for an island to restock on food and supplies.
Note: The sweeping oceanic shots of the film, often towards a horizon during a setting sun, are breathtaking. I’d be deeply surprised if Academy award-winning cinematographer Hoyt van Hoytema (“Oppenheimer”) doesn’t win another Oscar for his latest collaboration with director Nolan.
On a lush island, Odysseus and his hungry men follow a flock of potentially-tasty sheep into a tall, dark cave, where they are trapped by a giant cyclopean shepherd (Bill Irwin). The Cyclops eats a couple of the men before Odysseus blinds it while it’s resting. This gives them only a marginal advantage, and they barely escape the island. The crew later realize the Cyclops is a son of the sea god Poseidon, who’ll seek retribution with stormy seas.
Note: The motion-capture performance and voice of the Cyclops was performed by actor/comedian Bill Irwin, who also voiced and performed the puppetry for the repurposed military robot TARS in Nolan’s “Interstellar.” The Cyclops in this film is less a monster and more a misunderstood being, who’s capable of speech, and whose life is turned upside down by the tiny, aggressive invaders in his home. That point is made clear by the line from one of Odysseus’s men; “Would you talk to ants?”
Odysseus’s forces reach the island of Aeaea, where they are lulled by the cry of a child before being charged by giant, armored Laestrygonians, who kill most of the crew.
Note: The child used to lure the invading Greeks into a trap by the Laestrygonians is deeply disturbing when we see the crying child is actually laughing.
Beating a hasty, bloody retreat from Aeaea, Odysseus loses most of his men, who soon mutiny against their leader.
Note: In Greek mythology, the massive Laestrygonians were also children of Poseidon, like the blinded Cyclops, which adds to the considerable wrath Odysseus and crew face when they escape to the sea.
The crew land at another green island filled with wild game, with Odysseus guarding the ship. They’re welcomed by the cunning witch Circe (Samantha Morton), who turns the hungry soldiers into pigs; a reflection of their own greed. While hunting, Odysseus kills a deer who reverts to a man. Finding Circe and her newfound pigs, Odysseus negotiates for Circe to change them back. Circe then tells Odysseus he must sail to the underworld of Hades in order to find Ithaca.
Note: Like the other supernatural entities of the movie, Circe (Samantha Morton) is played with considerable sympathy as a loner who doesn’t welcome the ravaging, hungry, greedy barbarians who invade her home. Morton (“John Carter,” “The Whale,” “Minority Report”) plays the role with considerate wisdom, which is fitting, since the word ‘witch’ (used in various modern translations of “The Odyssey”) comes from the Old English word ‘wicce,’ which means ‘wise woman.’
Forced to navigate a formidable whirlpool in order to reach Hades, Odysseus and his crew find themselves on a dark, rocky shore. There, Odysseus meets with the specter of Tiresias (James Remar), who tells him he’ll be the only survivor of this voyage…
Note: Actor James Remar, who plays the ghost of Tiresias, also played the ghostly head-vision of the titular serial killer’s father in the Showtime/Paramount+ series “Dexter,” and two of its spinoffs.
Odysseus and his crew are tormented by the ghosts of Agamemnon and the young soldier Sinon (Elliot Page), who was recruited in childhood to be a soldier, and was later killed at the beach outside of Troy. Soon, all the ghosts of Odysseus’s lost men emerge to chase the survivors back to their ship…
Note: Trans male actor Elliot Page is known for roles in “Juno” (2007), “X-Men: Days of Future Past” (2014) and Nolan’s “Inception” (2010), under his birth name of Ellen. Page’s casting as Sinon (falsely rumored to be Achilles) sparked unwarranted transphobic outrage, since Page delivers a perfectly fine performance in his roughly five minutes of screen time.
Still paying for their transgressions against Poseidon, the crew are attacked by sea monsters. As they approach the strait of the sirens, the crew plug their ears with wax to ignore their seductive, dangerous song, save for Odysseus–who asks to be lashed to a mast as they pass through the strait, as payment for blaspheming Poseidon.
Note: I was impressed that the siren song is never quite audible to the audience, and it ditches the usual cliché of such songs being a harmonious chorus of alluring wails. The full torture of their song is relayed entirely through Matt Damon’s performance.
With his starving crew coming ashore at Thrinacia, Odysseus forces them to swear not to eat the local cattle–who are the property of Helios, the sun god. When Odysseus is away, the crew break their promise. Upon escape, they once again face the full wrath of Poseidon, who destroys their ship, leaving Odysseus as the sole survivor–as Tiresias foretold.
Note: The mutinous crew’s spokesman is Eurylochus, Odysseus’s first officer and brother-in-law, played by actor Himesh Patel, who was in Danny Boyle’s “Yesterday” (2019), Nolan’s “Tenet” (2022) and the disaster-satire “Don’t Look Up” (2021).
On the island of Ogygia, Odysseus learns his trouble remembering stems from lotus leaves fed to him by the goddess Calypso (Charlize Theron), who takes pity on him after seven years, and helps him regain his memories. Odysseus then builds a raft, and faces the wrath of Poseidon in order to return…
Note: This star-studded movie also includes Oscar-winner Charlize Theron (“Monster,” “Atomic Blonde,” “Mad Max: Fury Road”), who plays Calypso. According to Greek mythology, Calypso was a nymph, living in exile on Ogygia for siding with her father Atlas and the Titans during their war with the Olympian gods. The name Calypso means “one who conceals,” which is in keeping with her suppression of Odysseus’s memories by feeding him lotus leaves with magic properties. Calypso would later be the name of French oceanographer Jacques Cousteau’s famed research vessel, which became the subject of a John Denver song in 1975.
Returning home to Ithaca, Odysseus seeks out his blind, loyal servant Eumaeus, who’s been expelled from the palace by the queen’s suitors. Odysseus devises a plan to gain entry into the palace disguised as a humble, anonymous beggar.
Note: Matt Damon trying to return home has been the subject of four high-profile films, including Steven Spielberg’s “Saving Private Ryan” (where he played the titular private), “Interstellar” (where he plays the deranged Dr. Mann, who went insane searching for a new planet for humanity), “The Martian” (where he spends nearly the entire movie using science and engineering to reunite with his shipmates and return to Earth) and now, the ultimate homeward quest, Homer’s “The Odyssey.”
The ambitious Antinous conspires with Polybus (Corey Hawkins) to press Penelope into naming a successor for her presumed-dead husband, as their impatience grows close to an all-out coup.
Ever-faithful Eumaeus (John Leguizamo) returns from exile with a ‘beggar’ who seeks a private meeting with his queen.
Note: Actor/comedian John Leguizamo has a long and colorful career with roles in such movies as “To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar” (1995), “Romeo + Juliet” (1996), “Spawn” (1997), “Chef” (2014), “John Wick” (2014) and “Land of the Dead” (2005), one of the late director George Romero’s famed “Dead” movie series.
The ‘beggar’ convinces the queen–who realizes his true identity but keeps his secret safe from the suitors–to hold a final contest to decide the next ruler of Ithaca; a challenge with an old bow that only her husband could master. After all suitors fail, the beggar takes the bow and passes the challenge. This results in a literal battle royale where Odysseus and his son Telemachus are wounded, and Antinous is killed. As Odysseus reclaims his power, the remaining suitors kneel in deference to their returned ruler.
Note: The trick that Odysseus does with shooting a single arrow through multiple axes to hit a distant target became the logo for TSG Entertainment, a company that finances movie productions (though not this one). Their movies include “The Martian” and “Ford vs. Ferrari,” both of which starred Matt Damon.
In one major liberty with the story, Odysseus and his beloved Penelope decide to take a fine ship, with a fine crew and head off to spend their golden years together in exile–leaving their worthy heir Telemachus as the new ruler of Ithaca.
Note: The ending is a departure–both figurative and literal–from the poem’s many translations, but I liked it, as it gives Telamachus his own destiny apart from searching for his father. It also allows the exhausted Odysseus to live happily ever after with his beloved Penelope in exile rather than simply reclaiming his leadership. Besides, what’s the point of adapting a 3,000 year old poem if you’re not going to try and freshen it up?
The End
Note: Unless Nolan adapts “The Iliad,” too…?
Summing It Up
As a longtime fan of stop-motion FX producer Ray Harryhausen fantasy films, such as “Jason and the Argonauts” (1963), “Clash of the Titans” (1981) and his three “Sinbad” movies (1958-1977), I wondered if writer/director Christopher Nolan could recapture that kind of mythical escapism with “The Odyssey,” given its literary importance.
As required reading once upon a time for many school kids (including myself), “The Odyssey” automatically bears a weighty legacy, just as interpreting stories from the Bible or William Shakespeare might. Nolan gives the story its due, but stops short of groveling, by having his international cast speak in modern parlance with American accents–eschewing the typical British accents too often heard when depicting ancient cultures, haughty villainy, or royalty (British or not). While this choice might be controversial to those who’d prefer tradition over practicality, I see it as making the movie more accessible to a wider audience. Also nice to see that the fantasy elements of Homer’s poem–the cyclops, the giants, witchcraft, godly wrath, etc–are delivered with a deft reality by combining in-camera practical elements seamlessly integrated with CGI visual effects. I think the late Ray Harryhausen (1920-2013) would’ve loved this film.
The cast marshaled for this movie is an embarrassment of riches; Matt Damon, Anne Hathaway, Tom Holland, Zendaya, Charlize Theron, Robert Pattinson, John Leguizamo, Mia Goth and so many more than my aged brain could possibly remember for this column. Damon is the gravitational center of the film as Odysseus, absentee ruler of Ithaca and Trojan war veteran whose greatest wish is simply to return home. This is almost an inside joke, given Damon’s previous roles in “Saving Private Ryan,” “The Martian” and Nolan’s “Interstellar.” If I have any criticism of the casting, it’s that so many big-name, high-profile actors are squeezed into this one film that many of them are reduced to little more than cameos. The movie’s wealth of big-name talent may have also deprived a few talented, scrappy, no-name actors the chance to become breakouts. This would’ve made the film a bit less of a “Where’s Waldo?” game by allowing a few lesser-knowns to better immerse themselves into the movie’s milieu.
As with most movies these days, there was culture war-baiting ‘controversy’ regarding some of the support role casting, specifically with actor Elliot Page as Sinon (a character originally featured in Virgil’s “Aeneid,” not “The Odyssey”) and actress Lupita Nyong’o as Helen of Troy and her twin sister Clytemnestra. Both actors are in this film for a combined total of about ten minutes. This disputation is just so much noise, with no relevance to the movie itself. “The Odyssey” is fantasy, not history. Those who take the various translations of “The Odyssey” they read in school as immutable text forget its long oral tradition, passed down for centuries before it was ever written. The world has certainly changed tremendously in 3,000 years, and you’d be hard pressed to find modern actors fluent in Ancient Greek, or who fit vague-at-best descriptions of ancient classic figures. Nolan’s film of “The Odyssey” is but one interpretation in a three-millennia series of interpretations. There’s no definitive text of this ancient story.
Beyond the movie’s wealth of talent (both in front of and behind the cameras), “The Odyssey” is a return to grand cinematic epics set in ancient times (“Ben-Hur,” “The Ten Commandments,” “Cleopatra” etc), but with decades of improved visual effects and in unprecedented IMAX scope. The scale of this $250 million film (shot on actual 70mm IMAX film, not digital video) make it a must-see theatrical experience. Craning your head up slightly to take in the full height of the giant cyclops in the darkened cave, for example, is a memorable cinematic moment, like gazing up at that massive, tree-grazing brachiosaur in “Jurassic Park.” I only regret seeing “The Odyssey” with a rude, thoughtless audience who were more concerned with following the World Cup on their smartphones than enjoying a movie we all paid to see. Nevertheless, this powerhouse of a film is nearly audience-proof.
Just as “Dances with Wolves,” “Unforgiven” and “Tombstone” briefly revived the long-dead western genre in the early 1990s, it’s possible this film might herald a new wave of grand fantasies set in ancient times. One thing is certain; “The Odyssey” is a showcase of pure, undiluted cinema that is less about returning home, and more about returning audiences to giant movie palaces–what few of them still exist.
Where to Watch
As of this writing, “The Odyssey” is in exclusive theatrical release in multiple viewing formats (IMAX, Dolby Cinema, Standard Digital, etc), but might become available to Peacock when it comes to streaming, given that it’s a Universal release. We’ll wait and see.
