Attacking “THE ODYSSEY”

Φάε πολύ τυρί, γίνε μεγάλος και δυνατός.

The French, sensible folk that they are, never calculate box-office figures according to how much money was racked up, rather by the number of tickets sold. This enables comparisons across decades without recourse to tricky, theoretical inflation-adjustments. The Odyssey, which has been taking astronomical sums in pretty much every territory since its global release last week, achieved 1,841,065 French admissions in its first seven days, eclipsing by more than 5000 the previous record for a Christopher Nolan-directed picture — The Dark Knight Rises back in 2012 (1,835,547.)

Sounds impressive. But given the widespread ballyhoo about how remarkably well The Odyssey is doing at the box-office, it’s surprising to learn that the French debut only ranks as the 84th biggest of all time, one spot behind Rocky IV — which premiered there on 22nd January 1986 (i.e. just eight days after the shocking and tragic death of Daniel Balavoine.) Also, the population of France has increased from around 57 million in 1986 to over 69 million today, an increase of more than 20%. The bottom line: for myriad reasons cinemagoing is no longer the mass pursuit it was When Rocky Beat The Russian. As Anne Hathaway’s Penelope tearfully exclaims in The Odyssey (and its trailers): “That world is gone!”

Nolan knows that cinema’s golden age is similarly kaput, and that even he is incapable of bringing it back. But that doesn’t stop him hankering for The Good Old Days: despite the “woke” veneer that inspired so much comical frothing from the rabid right (especially outraged at the casting of Lupita N’yongo as Helen of Troy), he’s a small-c conservative filmmaker at heart. Practical effects wherever possible, analogue emphasis, 70mm projections, showing the picture first to critics rather than influencers, having almost every character speak English with an American accent, and putting his post-Oppenheimer clout at the service of near-defunct sub-genre.

It’s undeniably heartening that The Odyssey is making such significant waves, is making such a positive impact in so many ways: translations of Homer’s original text, especially the Emily Wilson translation upon which Nolan drew for this screenplay, are flying off the shelves worldwide. It seems likely that interest in studying the Classics at universities and schools will experience a significant boost, and that Greek myths will receive yet another of their period surges in popularity. Anything that gets people away from their televisions (streaming is just telly!) and into cinemas can only be a Very Good Thing, especially when what they’re watching is relatively intelligent material primarily intended for adults rather than targeted at teenagers and/or children (i.e superhero slop).

Better peplum than pablum: Nolan revisits and updates the sword-and-sandal genre which was such a prominent strain of mainstream cinema in North America and Europe throughout the 1950s and 1960s. The success of Ridley Scott’s Gladiator (2000) seemed to potentially open the door for a peplum revival, only for this to be derailed four years by the disappointing North American returns for Wolfgang Petersen’s spirited, enjoyably fast-and-loose version of Homer’s Iliad, the widely-underrated Troy (a considerable smash pretty much everywhere else).

Scott, by this point Sir Ridley, had another go with Gladiator II in 2024, an unfairly-maligned sequel which turned a nice profit. And now we have Nolan’s Odyssey, the director having been set to make Troy around 2003 before producer Petersen decided he wanted to take charge himself; Nolan instead switched his focus to comic-book material via Batman Begins (2005).

Nolan is drastically more faithful to Homer than Troy’s scriptwriter David Benioff, taking occasional liberties such as changing the Lestrygionians from cannibal barbarians to outsized, seemingly invincible warriors in anachronistic medieval armour. Samantha Morton gloriously stops the show in her sequence as Circe, the practical effects used to depict the (temporary) transformation of Odysseus’ men into swine harking squarely back to Neil Jordan’s The Company of Wolves (1984).

In the film, Odysseus spends only a few minutes with Circe; Homer has them living together for a year, and in most other versions of the story they have children together. Nolan does include the detail of Odysseus living with Calypso on her paradise island for seven years, but time ceases to have any meaning for him thanks to the amnesia-inducing lotus-blossoms she feeds him. There is no acknowledgement that the duo have sex — though, since Calypso is played by Charlize Theron (with decidedly 21st-century eyebrows and make-up), we can presume that this transpires off-screen. Nolan’s emphasis is on Odysseus as a devoted husband to Penelope, and Penelope as a steadfast, supernaturally patient wife: she waits a full 20 years for his return, resisting the attentions of dozens of persistent and boorish suitors.

Nolan’s screenplay switches between Odysseus’ wild adventures on his sea-journey homeward and events back in Ithaca, while throwing in multiple flashbacks to the Trojan War — the latter chiefly recounted by Menelaus (Jon Bernthal), just as Odysseus’ post-war travails are narrated by the man himself at Circe’s request. Both men may well be unreliable, self-serving narrators — the bulk of what we see in this film is explicitly filtered through the recollections of its teller(s), which provides Nolan with a very handy excuse for any inconsistencies or implausibilities. When (un-?)dead warrior Sinon (Elliot Page) sternly urges Odysseus to keep his name alive with his stories, he chattily concludes “… feel free to add some stuff” — a rare witty line in an otherwise largely-leaden screenplay.

Nolan takes Sinon’s licence to heart. But the basic problem is that The Odyssey becomes three films crammed into one, and even at nearly three hours (the maximum run-time currently allowed by the IMAX format) there’s a distinct quart-into-pint-pot feel. The Ithaca intrigues could easily have been trimmed, but presumably this would have resulted in the picture (even taking into account Calypse and Circe) being a male-dominated affair to an off-putting degree.

Even when Odysseus does make it back to his own palace, and the two main strands finally converge, Nolan’s sure touch fatally deserts him. The climactic battle-sequence, set to a pummellingly cacophonous drum crescendo from composer Ludwig Göransson, sees Odysseus (with some help from his son Telemachus) dispatch all of the suitors one by one. It’s an extreme example of the essentially absurd ‘courteous combat’ sequences familiar from classic martial-arts extravaganzas, in which an individual is able to dispatch dozens of foes because the latter graciously hang back from rushing him en masse and instead allow themselves to be picked off individually. It’s an especially silly contrivance here, as Odysseus must rely mainly on his bow-and-arrow. Like Rocky, he’s a man “facing the ultimate challenge. And fighting for his life” — but while Ivan Drago was something of a one-man army, even he was still just the one man.

Neil Young
24th July 2026

The Odyssey is a much more fantastical tale than The Iliad—for example, the Gods this time play a much more central role—and would seem to require a Peter Jackson or Terry Gilliam, rather than the safe-hands approach of Troy‘s Petersen.
— Defending “Troy,” Jigsaw Lounge, 18/5/2004

*Avec 1.841.065 entrées en 1 semaine #lOdyssee réalise le meilleur démarrage de la carrière de #Nolan devant The Dark Knight Rises (1.835.547). Il s’agit 84eme démarrage de l’histoire derrière Rocky IV.
— Monsieur le Chiffre (BOX-OFFICE) @boxofficenuls, 22/7/2026

 

the notes
====================================
1. Ominous logo (Universal)
2. All are American
3. Athena! (Zendaya)
4. Dog is 20+? yes: Argos
5. dulcimer music? old-timey Greek instruments.
6. Telemachus “Mom…” (x2)
7. interpolated flashbacks abound
8. Theron’s 21st-century eyebrows and make-up job
9. sensurroundy rumblings
10. Malickian/trailery voiceover
11. “lucky bastard” x 2
12. their 2nd stop: cyclops! (33min)
13. Polyphemus’ cheese!
14. Attack On Titan stuff ….. setpiece ends 45m
15. power of Athena!
16. it’s his story, as told to Calypso — dodgy memory, a handy get-out
17. Bernthal = Mensch-elaus
18. all this is happening after the main event (Troy, The Iliad)
19. WHY IS HORSE ON BEACH? Trojan horse seems a dopey plan — here rendered physical and implausible (where are wheels?). Visualised, it makes no sense — and it’s not even part of this story (wily Odysseus!)
20. the contours of an epic (cf TROY)
21. Trojan war as told by Menelaus
22. Agamemnon = Darth Vader
23. hard enough to tell this story under 3hr without all the Iliad insertions
24. medieval warriors — more giants! — mobile trees
25. cf Causeway Chase in 28YL.
26. Odysseus — wily, but…. incompetent? Bad luck? bad leader…?
27. an understandable mutiny
28. 69m MORTON AS CIRCE — The Company of Wolves
29. “River of fire” meets “river of ice” — where is all this taking place? — Hades seems Nordic!
30. “Feel free to add some stuff” says ghost of Sinon
31. Safdie never seen full-face
32. Tiresias! (James Remar)
33. half of it seems to be them running back to their ships
34. Mia Goth — does she have anything to do here (answer: NO!)
35. “People from the sea” /// “Zeus’ Law” often repeated
36. WE don’t hear the siren song — nice touch.
37. brief, spectacular Scylla
38. Oxen of the Sun (107min)
39. Odysseus’ Confidential chats with Athena
40. sub-Weir sea-peril
41. defying fate / prophecy — not a good idea
42. blind (Eumeaues) man doesn’t recognise a voice?!
43. 20yo dog on dungheap
44. TROY > THE ODYSSEY
45. —
46. “Don’t look for gods in men or you’ll be disappointed”
47. Argos’ wagging tail!    nice touch!
48. 132m Zeus’ Law, i.e. fear of gods in disguise/mufti
49. The “lot” — he keeps it all this time? a flub!
50. score increasingly conventional
51. 20yr = 10yr on beach, 2yr lost, 7yr Calypso, 1yr journey?
52. bloodless battles, Hollywood style
53. OLD-SCHOOL = CONSERVATIVE = ANALOGUE / 70mm / SHOWN TO CRITICS FIRST NOT INFLUENCERS
54. no sign of Hector or Achilles here
55. Athena revealed as a spectre of his guilt (ambiguous)
56. DECAPITATION OF “ATHENA”
57. End of age of bronze — nostalgia for a golden age — after the fall.
58. only he can do the bow-trick = excalibur (EXCALIBUR > THE ODYSSEY)
59. one vs dozens — courtesy-combat (OK, it’s a myth)
60. cacophony crescendo – drums speed up — accelerando
61. unreadable blue-on-black credits
62. Sir Christopher Nolan: WOKE VENEER, CONSERVATIVE AT HEART