LET'S GO HOME
Notes on THE ODYSSEY
… huh! fine, i guess? not bad not great only fine.
to begin with i am not a nolan hater. interstellar and memento are great, the batman movies are fun, and i was shocked at how much i liked oppenheimer— thought it was a classic that only he could’ve made. even tenet is bad in a way that’s entertaining and i’ll happily watch it whenever i’m on a plane. but so much about this just didn’t land for me. i think the trademark nolan structure and writing stuff just doesn’t work in a way that i’m still thinking about
useful to compare it to oppenheimer, another big ambitious movie about a great man reckoning with the moral weight of his greatest accomplishment featuring a star-studded cast and some clever structural design that allows for some nonlinear storytelling
starting with the titular men: oppenheimer is a better character than odysseus. don’t think it’s due to the performances so much (though cillian murphy is a little better than damon), but that the movie knows that oppy is the fulcrum for the whole thing. for the structure to work it has to revolve around him, and spending that much time with him also gives us space for the character, overcoming some of nolan’s writing weaknesses with sheer volume.
the dialogue is so clunky at times lol. really hope nolan’s next movie is him directing someone else’s screenplay because come on: “our age of bronze is over”?
in contrast the structure works against the film here. tom holland is better than i’ve ever seen him but still just whatever, and the film’s dragged down by spending so much time with him. robert downey jr he is not. took a while to really get up to steam— first act is a little disjointed due to all the setup work
i kinda feel like oppenheimer required so much effort to work that it forced nolan to do better with the writing, whereas the odyssey is such an easier narrative lift that he didn’t feel that same urgency with the writing and thus fell short? or maybe nolan’s thing just works better as a way to explore one man’s personal obsession than a sweeping epic
there are so many Big Names in the cast but it’s shocking how little we actually get from them. anne hathaway does what she can with some clunky dialogue, zendaya is there to hit a single disappointed emote in every scene, and lupita nyong’o gets a lot less than you’d think as helen/clytemnestra. there’s nothing on par with casey affleck’s cameo in oppenheimer.
charlize theron gets absolutely nothing as calypso and it’s actively harmful to the movie, odysseus working through his memories on her island is one of the central devices through which we get most of his story
there is some good stuff tbh: john leguizamo is great, elliot page’s frailness is a really good fit for the role (hades scene a highlight) and samantha morton’s circe is a standout
matt damon’s odysseus… look, damon already has a standout multi-part epic performance as a dangerous and cunning amnesiac soldier traversing vast distances trying to find his way back home and in the process learning that the actions he took to achieve military objectives were morally inexcusable: jason bourne! damon’s not bad but nolan’s story allows him no twists and turns. this isn’t a “complicated man,” it’s a boot with regrets
rob pattinson the standout because he’s the one character who seems like he’s having any kind of fun lol. just absolutely steals all the ithaca scenes, there’s a reason “somebody get these beggars out of here!” is the one clip that’s gone viral. felt a little bad for tom holland whenever they were in a scene together. real deal movie star
getting to the actual plot: look, the odyssey has been a hit for 2500 years and counting for a reason. even simply playing the hits is engaging enough to be a great story. nolan’s central theme, which he keeps restating in thuddingly obvious ways, is that the sack of troy via trojan horse was a betrayal of “zeus’ law” of hospitality (xenia, here described as “treat others as you would want to be treated”), and this betrayal sparked a cascading wave of societal decay that led to the bronze age collapse. odysseus not a trickster or warlord but a tired worn-down general who’s coming to realize he and his men have become monsters who do not belong in any place called “home,” including ithaca— they are the mysterious sea peoples raiding coastal lands
i actually do respect taking such a clear thematic stance, i just don’t think it’s done that well, especially compared to oppenheimer
i think the weak dialogue and the lack of space/scope really hampers the movie here— feel like nolan forgets that character comes through time. not just the encounter but also the spaces before and after it
oddly more compelling as a small personal movie than a grand blockbuster. lot of nolan’s political neuroses about the modern age in here— like i thought oppenheimer had a lot of it but somehow this is even more of a “guy despairing about how victories won through immoral means have created a world that will ultimately destroy the winners and everything they claimed to be fighting for” movie. oppenheimer ends with bombs dropping everywhere but odysseus’ exile feels even darker in a sense: not even bothering to offer a vision of the end, just an exit. hope he’s in therapy
nolan never a big sex guy but it’s almost striking here how chaste this film is. the seven years with calyposo are totally neutered, the suitors are more bros hanging out than sexual threats, and the sexual violence at troy that is the emotional fulcrum of the movie is only alluded to vaguely.
telling that nolan didn’t do nausicaa, that section of the odyssey has everything this movie is missing: unapologetic comedy, sexual tension, and compelling female characters.
yet another way in which rob patt seems to be the only one who Gets It is that he’s the only character with a sex drive. sleazy swaggering and lascivious, it’s a delight to watch
also interesting how odysseus’ slaves become servants (really just one, mia goth), vaguely recall from reading the fagles high school that they’re more prominent and explicitly preyed upon by the suitors?
kinda fascinating how nolan sidesteps the fantastical elements of the story whenever possible. no gods, a bare minimum of magic. idk if due to modern humanist sensibilities or his personal vision of a plot as a problem to be solved through formal logic but either way it’s to his detriment; funny enough i thought the fantastical scenes were consistently the strongest (circe, hades, cyclops, sirens)
think the imax cameras really hamper structure too; so so many cuts and short scenes, never enough time to sit with characters. the frenetic pace was present a bit in oppenheimer but flowed better there, i thought. this felt long overall but rushed on a scene-by-scene level
also was not as cinematic/visually stunning as i expected? some fun shots and you can see that a lot of money went into making this but also very like washed out for most of the movie? didn’t see it in imax so maybe that’s on me.
i think i respect this more than i like it, tbh. intensely personal $250 million movie with a central theme so clear it’s borderline didactic. work with a screenwriter next time, man
quick hits
funny that this got attacked by right wing trolls for the race-blind casting when this is one of the most christian blockbusters in recent memory. biggest movie of the year is about how the failure to honor god and follow the Golden Rule will make your society crumble! the climactic speech is one character confessing his sins to another in what very unavoidably a confession booth! nolan very obviously a small-c conservative who cares deeply about Western Values, he’d be on your side if you weren’t such idiots
the armenian couple sitting next to me walked out after 40 mins lol. the wife was heavily pregnant tho so who knows
that last fight… eh. nolan never great at staging fight scenes like that, and the movie has to work really hard give tom holland’s telemachus something to do. i forgive a lot about a movie if it nails the finale and this does not
speaking of the finale, unfair to compare nolan’s odyssey to ulysses but kinda says it all that joyce’s retelling has the most famous female monologue in english literature and nolan has… what? what does penelope get?
beside the point but man the last 4 chapters of ulysses really are just beyond compare. nothing to add that hasn’t been said a million times before but 5000 square feet and 125 decibles can’t even come close to the descriptions of bloom and stephen dedalus heading home
funnier than i expected given nolan, there’s some quality dry humor sprinkled throughout. damon at his best when he gets sardonic and bitchy: “did you think if you ate quietly the sun god wouldn’t find out”
i stand with emily wilson, watching an adaptation of something you love deeply that doesn’t grasp any of the things that initially drew you to the work is a special kind of hell. people calling her a haughty academic but i read her review as anything but: “there are no sex scenes, and all the food looks horrible”