Is Christopher Nolan ballsy enough to do ‘The Odyssey’ justice?
The Ancient Greeks could be downright filthy. Their deities spent most of their time having sex, attacking each other, and gossiping, while the humans down below occupied themselves with making nude art and coming up with spicy new philosophical frameworks. One of the most famous texts to come out of this period is Homer’s The Odyssey, a hefty tome about a man named Odysseus who gets lost on the way home from the Trojan War while his wife Penelope tries to fight off a constant queue of bachelors.
When it was announced that Christopher Nolan would be directing an adaptation of this foundational bit of storytelling, most of the reactions were positive. He is, after all, a master of cinematic spectacle. The fact remains, however, that so far, at least, his movies lack the kind of devilish pizazz that is required to do The Odyssey justice. Should we expect the fantastical, borderline camp, tale that Homer told, or a sombre, self-important look at the realities of maritime travel in the 8th century BC?
There have been plenty of mirthless takes on ancient cultures. The first Gladiator, for example, was pretty hellbent on sticking to themes of slavery and political unrest aside from all those allusions to sibling incest. 300, a very unserious film that took itself with utmost seriousness, tried to take a similar approach to Ancient Sparta. To its credit, it was very campy and very funny, but none of that was intentional. If you want to make an even closer analogy, Troy took a straight-down–the-middle approach to Ancient Greece and ended up looking like a lumbering relic of Old Hollywood. Even its actors disowned it.
The trouble with The Odyssey is that it leaves even less room for self-seriousness because it is chock-full of fantastical creatures. There is an evil cyclops from whom Odysseus escapes by clinging to the underbelly of a sheep. There is a sea nymph who falls madly in love with him and locks him away on her island for seven years. There are even man-eating giants. Then there are the Greek Gods themselves, who hang out on Mount Olympus and tamper with the goings-on below. Taika Waititi can make a peanut gallery of blinged-out deities work, but can Nolan?
The other issue is that Nolan has shown himself to be pretty scared of both sex and female characters, an absolutely lethal combination in most stories and especially so in The Odyssey. So far, Charlize Theron, Anne Hathaway, Zendaya, Mia Goth, and Lupita Nyong’o have all been confirmed for the film, which suggests that there will be some dramatic heft to their roles. However, there was reason to believe the same thing when Emily Blunt and Florence Pugh were added to the Oppenheimer cast, but they both ended up being underutilised.
As for sex, The Odyssey is full of it. In fact, it’s one of the central themes. Fidelity, disloyalty, and power are all explored through eroticism, whether it’s Penelope staying stubbornly celibate while her husband journeys home for ten years, Odysseus having sex with goddesses, or their maids succumbing to the advances of the suitors. It’s hard to imagine Nolan staying true to the source material on this one. Oppenheimer was notable for having a couple of romantic encounters between Cillian Murphy’s character and Pugh’s character, but the director admitted to being “appropriately nervous” about shooting them.
The Odyssey, if adapted faithfully, will require a little more than sensitivity to get the point across. It will need brio. Maybe Nolan will be able to find his way in if he makes the sex scenes mind-bendingly nonlinear. Just a thought. The fact that Mia Goth is involved is encouraging.
Ultimately, we won’t know how Nolan will deal with these very anti-Nolan elements until July of 2026, but I, for one, have faith that he can rise to the occasion. He made significant strides with Oppenheimer, which displayed a much deeper emotional arc than any of his other movies. If his next step is mastering the art of Ancient Greek sleaze, cinema will be all the better for it.
