Review - The Odyssey

Rating: 9/10

Director: Christopher Nolan | Screenplay: Christopher Nolan, based on Homer's Odyssey | Cast: Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, Charlize Theron, Samantha Morton, Zendaya, Benny Safdie, Bill Irwin, Jon Bernthal, John Leguizamo, Lupita Nyong'o | Cinematography: Hoyte van Hoytema | Music: Ludwig Göransson | Runtime: 172 min | Rated: R

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The Odyssey is spectacular, grand, tense, with moments that feel almost mythic in scale. One of Nolan's best. Sitting there in the dark, I confirmed it to myself all over again, he's one of my favourite directors alive.

The atmosphere does the heavy lifting

The mood this thing builds keeps you locked in for almost three hours straight. It reminded me of Dunkirk, because the music and the sound design genuinely make the difference. Ancient Greek instruments, scrap metal and gongs formed the unique sound Ludwig Göransson created for the film's score. Nolan doesn't use sound as decoration. He uses it as pressure. Some of the calls he makes are just outstanding. The Cyclops scene is almost too heavy to sit through. In the Sirens sequence they compress the sound so tightly that you feel like you're on the boat with the rest of the crew.

But the craziest scene for me? The eating scene with Circe. So Grotesque and metamorphic. Samantha Morton plays her so still and so quiet that the horror hits twice as hard. It's the moment Nolan turns into a horror director and it works so well.

The casting and the one that didn't work

People complained plenty about the casting before anyone had seen a frame. Didn't bother me. Most of this cast is excellent.

Matt Damon does what Matt Damon does best. He got back home :D Jokes aside, he's superb as Odysseus, a clever, stubborn, and deeply flawed man whose choices leave scars on everybody standing near him. Robert Pattinson in the villain role was a highlight for me. His Antinous, the loudest of the suitors circling Penelope's house, is smug and greedy and thoroughly punchable, and you can tell he's having the time of his life. Tom Holland was my least favourite. Something in his acting just didn't fit here. His voice sounded too optimistic, too bright for this world. Nobody in the cast uses an accent, which is fine and mostly invisible, but they should have made different choices about how he delivered the part. Telemachus should sound like a kid raised on twenty years of absence and dread. He sounds like a guy who's never had a bad week.

What they did with Agamemnon, though, I loved. Benny Safdie plays him with a Darth Vader vibe, frightening, mysterious, not a word out of him until one scene where the mask finally comes off. I genuinely thought they'd go all the way with the homage when he walks into Troy.

Three hours that don't feel like it

I was nervous about the runtime going in. Never felt it. The pacing holds for basically the entire ride, with almost nothing wasted. It moves, it's got action, but the action never swallows the film. Nolan pulls his usual non linear trick and instead of chopping the story up, it keeps you moving, keeps you inside it. You really do feel like you're out there on the journey with him.

The verdict

The Odyssey isn't just monsters and gods. It's about guilt, perseverance and that impossible urge to get back to the person you used to be. Seriously impressed. Almost a perfect movie. There are a couple of things I'd change and Holland is most of that list.

Go see it in a cinema. Biggest screen you can find. I'm just sorry I couldn't catch it in IMAX 70mm, because I'd bet money that's an even crazier ride.

9/10