Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey: Wearing Homer as a skin suit

Rich reflects on his truly deranged reaction to the film, after entering a manic state and staying up all night penning a 2500 word rant.

Meanwhile Cam had a nice time at the cinema and gives it a soft seven. Benny liked it too, until he thought about it, and is now hopelessly hung up on whether you can fairly judge an adaptation of something you know so well.

Just after we recorded, Emily Wilson came out swinging with a review in the London Review of Books, in which she shares many of our disappointments:

Nolan’s Odyssey lacks many of the elements that make the poem great. It 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. It lacks psychological, emotional, political and ethical depth. Its narrative structure is gimmicky. The writing is abysmal. None of the characters has convincing motivation for their actions or words.

Oof. anyway, 7/10

Full transcripts are available at doyouevenlit.com, where you can filter and search episodes by key ideas, authors, etc.

CHAPTERS:

(00:00:00) a normal and proportionate reaction
(00:07:25) Homer's Odysseus vs the Matt Damon character
(00:22:59) nostalgia for Nolan blowing our teenage minds
(00:29:30) Making Zeus's law central to the entire plot
(00:39:46) do we like the treatment of the Gods
(00:45:52) woke casting discourse and post-Christian morality
(00:59:52) Half-hearted slaughter of the suitors
(01:05:53) final ratings + has book club ruined our ability to enjoy things

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