Movie Review: The Odyssey

4 stars out of 5

The Odyssey has raked in more than $700 million thus far. Of that, I have contributed $5. It was a very rainy Bargain Tuesday so I ducked into the theater to wait out the deluge. I know, I know, I was supposed to see this in IMAX, 70mm if possible, but instead I just sat really close.

Truth is, I’ve been burned by Christopher Nolan too many times to spring for the premium screening anyway. And maybe he’s quietly realized he isn’t all that. Because these “based on somebody else’s work/lives” stories in his recent films have actually been pretty decent, compared to his super-complicated own creations. I liked that Oppenheimer, which I saw 2/3 of on a plane and was compelled enough to rent it to see the rest. I hear Dunkirk was good but I think maybe I was in the hospital and also, feh for big dumb war movies.

Now, I’ve never read Homer’s The Odyssey, although, funny thing, on the radio they said it was flying off the shelves, especially the Emily Wilson translation. And that night I’m at Joe’s Pub and the woman next to me is reading the Emily Wilson translation. I guess that could’ve been a ‘meet cute’ but I wasn’t interested and besides, she was with a dude.

I digress.

So, without background knowledge, I was leaving it in Nolan’s hands to tell me the tale of The Odyssey, and by god he does it in a pretty straightforward way. Everything I saw I’m assuming was in the original version but you Homeric scholars including that Joe’s Pub lady should feel free to correct me.

Matt Damon is my boy, I would gladly follow him into battle, so he is well-cast as Odysseus. No one had ever gone on an adventure like this guy so they invented the word odyssey. He leads the Greek into Troy, sneaks them in in the Trojan horse. When I was a kid it was always on wheels which would be a lot easier, but this time it has to be dragged in, with Elliot “Juno” Page as a lookout. Yay, they win, but it isn’t pretty, and Odysseus takes the long way home. Like, the looooooong way.

As Odysseus makes his odysseusy with his crew, they run into other mythical things you remember from childhood. Hey it’s a Cyclops! Wow, they’re trapped between Scylla and Charybdis like in that song by The Police (or “Rock and a Hard Place” for you mid-period Rolling Stones fans). And speaking of music, it’s the sirens!

Jon Bernthal is quite good as a mostly loyal crewman. Back home in Ithaca (not the one in New York, which I hear is gorges), we have Odysseus’s devoted wife Anne Hathaway weaving away in the backrooms, no doubt prepping for The Devil Wears Prada 3: QuiltMania. Mia Goth is wasted as her handmaiden. I mean, you expect Mia Goth to rip off her corset (wrong era? I’m on a roll) and be sexy Mia Goth but she just stays a handmaiden and thus could’ve been played by anybody. There are a bunch of creepy suitor dudes hanging around assuming that Odysseus won’t return. They are led by a very good and slimy Robert Pattinson, with a good and jerky Corey Hawkins by his side. But Anne Hathaway pays them no mind and just keeps weaving. You go!

Also loyal to Odysseus at home are John Leguizamo, convincing as an old blind shepherd, and Tom Holland as the son of Damon and Hathaway. Now, he’s believable as an innocent who is perhaps not ready to assume the throne, but come on Homer, his character is underwritten. Sonny boy leaves on an unnecessary journey and then comes back. Shrug emoji. Lupita Nyong’o can also blame Homer for not enough to do as Helen of Troy. There’s more activity for Mrs. Tom Holland Zendaya who is subtly spooky as Athena.

And this is just a sentence to say that Charlize Theron is the most beautiful woman in the world.

It is a very good movie. There is some cool action on land and sea and fighting and creatures, and Nolan keeps the story easy to follow. And beyond loyalty, we also get a couple of big concepts that resonate across the millennia: Odysseus’s skepticism of the laws of Zeus, and his slow acknowledgement of the horrible consequences of war. What Nolan seems unable to do is imbue the story with much emotion, which for me prevents it from being a genuinely great movie. Now do I have any takers to translate this review into Greek?