‘The Odyssey’ translator Emily Wilson says Christopher Nolan’s film “lacks psychological, emotional, political and ethical depth”
Emily Wilson, the translator of The Odyssey, has criticised Christopher Nolan’s new movie.
Wilson, a classicist who translated Homer’s epic in 2017, was previously cited by Nolan as an inspiration for bringing The Odyssey to the big screen.
However, now that she’s seen the film, Wilson has nothing particularly positive to say about Nolan’s version of The Odyssey, which is on track to be one of the biggest box office success stories of 2026.
Writing in the London Review of Books, Wilson shared, “I had hoped that Nolan’s affinity with these Homeric themes might push him to new creative heights, and enable him to conjure more believable characters. But The Odyssey features his usual combination of grandiosity and superficiality.”
She then claimed that Nolan’s “vision is too confused, its characters too underdeveloped, to deliver what it half-promises in terms of big ideas – although it is very good at conveying big bangs and big giants.”
Wilson added that it “lacks many of the elements that make the poem great”, and “has nothing convincing to say about time, memory, history, war, or about the relationship between one warrior’s glorious return and the lives of his family, adversaries, comrades, friends and neighbours”.
She scathingly continued, “It lacks psychological, emotional, political and ethical depth. Its narrative structure is gimmicky. The writing is abysmal.”
Wilson brutually added, “None of the characters has convincing motivation for their actions or words. There are no sex scenes, and all the food looks horrible.”
Furthermore, she stated that she “would be ashamed to have written any part of this script”.
While Nolan’s version of The Odyssey may not be a hit with Wilson, it has captured the imagination of the general public, who are going out in their droves to see it at cinemas.
After just two weekends in cinemas, it has now grossed $652 globally, including an impressive £11.9 million in the United Kingdom during its second weekend.
In a five-star review, Far Out wrote of Nolan’s latest picture, “The Odyssey is the film event of the year because it realises Nolan’s ambition of making cinema that needs to be experienced, and not just consumed. This is a story that can’t exactly be ‘spoiled’, but the visualisation, thematic analysis, and emotional calculations inherent to the filmmaker’s interpretation justify another retelling.”
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