Review: The Odyssey dir. Christopher Nolan
An impressive cast of excellent performances with a set of stunning visuals
Christopher Nolan’s version of The Odyssey lives up to both the epic nature of the poem’s long history and his own strong filmography.
Attributed to the poet Homer and translated into English by many over the years since, the Odyssey follows war hero Odysseus on his ten-year journey back home to Ithaca after a ten-year siege on the city of Troy.
Given the critical and commercial success of Oppenheimer, which grossed over $900 million and won seven Academy Awards, it seemed that Nolan had created an impossible follow-up challenge for himself.
Having seen all of Nolan’s previous twelve films and enthusiastically read the Odyssey when I was a teenager, I was certainly doubtful at the prospect of this adaptation. But Nolan has risen to the challenge, creating a new version of the myth for a modern audience which boasts an impressive cast of excellent performances with a set of stunning visuals to accompany them.
In a way, the Odyssey and Christopher Nolan seem like a perfect match. For a story from thousands of years ago, the Odyssey naturally contains so many of Nolan’s favourite hallmarks such as time, homecoming and drowning. In fact, it feels like Nolan already dipped into Odyssey territory as long ago as Inception (2010), and subsequent films Interstellar (2014) and Dunkirk (2017) have strong aspects of homecoming as well.
One of the greatest features of The Odyssey is its fantastic and rich ensemble of characters. While I equally love a small-scale story, it’s exciting to see a film where the protagonist encounters so many different characters. The truth is that life is full of people, some who stick around for a long time and others who you encounter only briefly. Both can have a profound impact on you. While films are often held back in this manner by practical constraints, I’m glad Nolan spent a decent chunk of his $250 million budget on the volume and quality of his cast.
The film is carried by the strong trio of Matt Damon as Odysseus, Tom Holland as Telemachus and Anne Hathaway as Penelope who are all excellent. It is great to see Holland shine as the naive and young Telemachus, and the parallels between the boy and his father increase the feeling of the lost twenty years between them.
I’ve seen a lot of discourse already around the screen time of certain actors, mostly in an attempt to diminish their roles. Oh, so-and-so was only onscreen for five minutes, cue the chorus of complaints: what a waste, that’s not a real part, why would you hire so-and-so for a cameo role.
Performances aren’t measured in minutes. It is a mistake to do so. There are so many great characters in The Odyssey who appear only briefly but have such strong narrative importance. This is a strength of the original poem and I’m glad it’s shone through.
My favourite supporting performance came from Samantha Morton as Circe. Morton has been a favourite of mine since I saw her performance as the truth-seeing Agatha in Minority Report (a Tom Cruise action flick which really punches above its weight). It feels strange to call Morton underrated given she’s a two-time Academy Award nominee, but I don’t think she would have been on many people’s prediction list for this role. She brings such a strong fierceness and rage to Circe coupled with vulnerability and longing which makes her performance so interesting.
While Morton stands out to me, there are so many others worthy of a mention: Himesh Patel as second-in-command Eurylochus toes the line perfectly as both a friend and a foil to Odysseus, Charlize Theron delivers a wonderfully dreamy, reserved and yet slightly threatening performance as the nymph Calypso, Lupita Nyong’o surprises in a way I won’t spoil, Robert Pattinson brings a realistic charisma to the villainous suitor Antinous and Benny Safdie strikes fear as Agamemnon with a strong presence heightened by Ellen Mirojnick’s great costume design.
While I do consider myself a fan of his work, I have very low standards for women in Nolan movies. Quite a few of his films have only have one or two female characters who get to be anyone significant. Nolan makes movies about men. Controversially, I don’t really expect more from him. What I would like to see is for Hollywood to fund more movies about women by women.
That being said, and perhaps my low expectations helped, there were a lot of female characters in The Odyssey who did indeed have strong narrative importance. Some of them have even been elevated above potential male characters. Despite the fact that many gods hover over the story, no actor was cast for Zeus or Poseidon, yet Zendaya appears as Athena. And the choice suits the film well—the presence of Zeus is clearly felt through the thunder in the soundtrack. There’s no need for him to appear.
Nolan’s other commonly cited shortcoming is his scriptwriting and that is the biggest weakness of The Odyssey. The dialogue feels extremely heavy-handed in parts. I would have loved to see it pared back and the audience trusted to put the pieces of the story together. Some emotional moments which should soar are let down by clunky lines.
Sometimes I worry we are losing writers in Hollywood as big-name directors are increasingly penning their own scripts. I would love to see Nolan work with a co-writer of some description again in the future. He can clearly see the main beats of a story but another writer might help him finesse the details, which are equally important.
Technically, the film is as impressive as you would expect. Editor Jennifer Lame excels in her third Nolan collaboration. Three-time Academy Award winner Ludwig Göransson once again delivers with a haunting score.
Rating: Highly recommend
Film: The Odyssey
Director: Christopher Nolan
Writer: Christopher Nolan (based on Homer’s Odyssey)
Starring: Matt Damon (Odysseus), Tom Holland (Telemachus), Anne Hathaway (Penelope), Robert Pattinson (Antinous), Lupita Nyong’o (Helen of Troy), Samantha Morton (Circe), John Leguizamo (Eumaeus), Zendaya (Athena), Charlize Theron (Calypso), Jon Bernthal (Menelaus), Himesh Patel (Eurylochus), Bill Irwin (Polyphemus), Elliot Page (Sinon), Benny Safdie (Agamemnon) and James Remar (Tiresias)
Release Date: 16 July 2026
Distributor: Currently showing in cinemas