Matt Damon's sensitive and repentant Odysseus might come as a surprise to Homer, as do some significant omissions concerning the poem's female characters.
It would be easy to think that the Odyssey, Homer's epic poem composed over 2,500 years ago, is all about Odysseus.
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It's called the Odyssey, after all.
It opens with the invocation to the Muse, “Tell me about a complicated man” – pulling no punches about the poem's theme.
This is, on the surface, an epic about a man coming home, a return voyage that spans fluorescent fantasy worlds and yawns across 10 years after the fall of Troy; a one-hero clash with monsters and princesses, giants and whirlpools, the fight to reclaim his place as king of Ithaca, and as the hero of an epic of his own.
But the point about an epic is that it also contains multitudes.
Nolan's Cinematic Odyssey
Christopher Nolan's latest film reckons with the breadth of the Odyssean legend, from the sack of Troy all the way to Odysseus's return, and seamlessly juggles the epic's multiple timelines and flashbacks.
While the jaw-dropping cinematic effects of a feature film shot with Imax cameras might seem entirely modern, the way Nolan captures the smashing of a ship's prow into the waves or the crunch of bones in the Cyclops' jaws have their roots in the dynamic visuality of Homer's poetry – what ancient commentators called enargeia, the epic's ability to bring the world to life before your eyes.
