In true Christopher Nolan fashion, The Odyssey is an exploration of memory, collective and individual. The film opens on the face of a modern bard, rapper Travis Scott, telling the tale of a man and his fleet, before progressing through the story as told by and to other characters. The film flips between the people who are waiting for Odysseus to return home and Odysseus himself as he journeys home. And while this is a story that has been told and retold a million times, in countless cultures and languages, all derived from the original poem by Homer, at its core, Nolan’s The Odyssey is not just an adaptation, but also his own translation of the story. It’s an examination of the stories we tell each other, the stories we tell ourselves, and the stories that stand the test of time.
Nolan’s version of Odysseus, played by Matt Damon (who has previously worked with Nolan in Interstellar and Oppenheimer, but never as a leading man), is an avatar for morality, honor, and duty. He is clever and capable, and he cares about his men, even when he has to sacrifice them. But he is not the trickster or philanderer that’s depicted in other translations of the story, which could be due to Nolan’s writing, but could also be due to Matt Damon and his “golden boy” reputation on the screen. Matt Damon is believable as the moral avatar, the person people would sacrifice themselves for, the one who gets to judge between good and bad, and the one who can repent and who can feel the weight of the sacrifices he’s responsible for, while still being cocky and sure of himself. The film does not glorify Odysseus’s tricks or war generally, instead focusing on the grief, the guilt, and the cost of war.
The film is wholeheartedly focused on its titular character and his reactions to things, and is not as interested in the gods themselves, or the objects of desire or the suffering of others. Nolan makes the choice to view the sirens from afar, and to hide their song, instead holding close on Odysseus’s face to convey the emotions of seeing and hearing them, as he reckons with the fact that he doesn’t really want to go home. He also makes the choice to keep the gods almost entirely hidden, instead only depicting their ire and their effects on Odysseus and his crew. In the film’s more violent scenes, where Odysseus’s men are ravaged by the gods, the camera holds a wide field of view, occasionally moving closer only to capture Odysseus’s pain. Just as the gods demanded so much from Odysseus, Nolan demanded the world from Damon, and he got it.
Damon’s performance is complimented by Himesh Patel (Yesterday, Tenet) as Odysseus’s right-hand man, the one who pushes back and questions Odysseus’s decisions. Damon’s performance is further grounded by Anne Hathaway (previously in Nolan’s Interstellar and The Dark Knight Rises) as Penelope, the grieving wife who is waiting at home for Odysseus, fending off suitors (including a cowardly and despicable Antinous, played expertly by Robert Pattinson) and trying to hold the throne while Ithaca is without its king. And his performance is balanced by two supporting performances that will live in my mind for a long time, John Leguizamo (Romeo + Juliet, John Wick) as the blind faithful servant, afraid of false hope, but even more afraid of losing hope, and Samantha Morton (Sweet and Lowdown, In America) as the vengeful nymph Circe. Elliot Page (Inception, Juno) also delivers a powerhouse performance as Sinon, a figure pulled from other Greek myths, serving as another reminder of the cost of war and cowardice.
Nolan and his collaborators, including his wife and producer Emma Thomas, cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema (Oppenheimer, Tenet), and composer Ludwig Göransson (Oppenheimer, Sinners), brought Homer’s poem to life through an incredible use of light, color, score, and scale. Every decision made by the team affected the ways the story would translate to the screen. The scale of the film carries through every aspect and every decision—the size of the cameras, the intensity of the locations, the breadth of the ensemble cast, the commitment to practical, in-camera effects, and the ever-present score and sound. Göransson’s score is haunting, exhilarating, and his most complete work yet.
Much has been made about the decision to film entirely on IMAX cameras, rightfully so, as this is the first film to do so. The decision to use only these large-format cameras increased the amount of information that could be captured on film, but also created limitations, for better or for worse. Some of the conversation shots involve some very skillful focus pulling, drawing the viewer’s attention between the characters’ faces without having to cut the shots up. The effect is very natural and preserves some of the intimacy of the conversations, and reserves Jennifer Lame’s signature frenetic editing for other sequences. But the shallow depth of field and soft focus of the IMAX cameras can be a bit distracting. The action sequences also felt extra shaky in a way that didn’t feel entirely intentional. But it cannot be understated how vast the scenery and the ship felt thanks to the cameras and the cinematography. Nolan and his team also didn’t let the these limitations stop them from attempting some truly incredible sequences, including submerging an IMAX camera during a powerful, baptism-like scene of Odysseus relinquishing control and giving himself over to the whims of Poseidon, as well as some impressive in-camera effects during Circe’s big moment.
The real effect of the format of the film is in the viewing experience. Last year’s Academy Award-winning phenomenon Sinners and its director Ryan Coogler paved the way for Nolan’s The Odyssey to go full speed into a conversation about which format to see a film on. Letterboxd even has a punch card so you can track all of the formats you’ve seen The Odyssey in, people are making videos breaking down the differences, and movie theaters are making videos of the projector setups. Most notably, people in my daily life are apologetic if they tell me they saw the film on regular IMAX and not 70mm IMAX, or if they could only see it in Dolby. It’s astounding.
Just as listening to Homer’s poem in Ancient Greece from different bards would lead to a different listening experience and understanding of the story, watching The Odyssey on different formats will give you a different viewing experience and could alter your feelings about the film itself. More of the original frame is available depending on which aspect ratio the film is projected in, and the color saturation and sound levels will differ by theater as well. Each is its own slight adaptation of Nolan’s specific translation. And like Homer’s work benefits from multiple reads and multiple translations, this movie will benefit from multiple viewings in multiple formats.
The power of adaptation is that the adaptor gets to decide how to form the story and the elements of the story in a way that speaks most to them. Although he worked from Emily Wilson’s translation, he still wrote his own version, effectively translating and adapting the work in his own vision. The film is a wholly modern reinterpretation, with visual and audio elements that call to the ancient roots of the story. The dialogue is colloquial and Americanized (and in some instances, the accents are incredibly Americanized. Looking at you, Jon Bernthal). The score is modern and experimental while being played on ancient instruments, including a lyre. The cast is more diverse than to be expected, which sends very contemporary messages, whether intentional or not. And the women in the story have more power and agency than would be traditionally afforded to them. And while the women are not perspective characters with their own individual backstories and existences outside of the context of men, they all have micro-arcs and they all serve to illustrate the historical place of women while pushing those boundaries a bit further than other imaginings of the story. The burdens of men’s actions and the costs of Odysseus’s sacrifices are worn by all of the women. They’re depicted in Penelope’s grief, Circe’s rage, Calypso’s pain, Athena’s manifestation, and Helen’s scars.
Every single one of these decisions transforms the message from being just a literal translation rooted in the historical context and into a modern cautionary tale about the dangers of breaking the fundamental covenants that exist between humans. While watching this film, Nolan wants you to have this version of the story, in this timeline, in the context in which we currently live. It’s impossible to shy away from the parallels between the “sea people,” men who think they’re on a just and righteous mission in the name of their king, and current imperialist militaries. Nolan is pushing the audience to grapple with faceless gods and leaders, moral codes, and destruction rooted in desperation.
There are no Greek gods here, and if we look for them in the faces of men, we will only be disappointed. There’s also no one coming to save us, and no one believes more powerfully that we can save ourselves than Christopher Nolan does. Even while exploring the consequences of actions that can’t be undone, a recurring theme in his films, he still seems to wholeheartedly believe that honor and justice can prevail as long as we confront the consequences of our actions.
