Hello readers! I was going to write a review for Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, but then I went on holiday – and now that I’m back, everyone seems to have seen it already and formed opinions of their own. The internet is swamped with reviews, and I doubt that I can offer any new insights. So, instead of a review, I’m going to talk about the pitfalls associated with adapting classic, well-loved stories to the big screen. Is there a method to making a good interpretation?
To briefly summarise my opinions on The Odyssey: I liked it. I found the film exciting and engaging, with some very impressive set pieces that used actual props, rather than CGI, to great effect. A lot of the dialogue was clunky, and occasionally some of the acting – which I have come to expect from Nolan – but everything else was so bombastic that I didn’t really mind. It was a solid film, and I’m still thinking about it two weeks after seeing it.
But you know what I’ve enjoyed just as much? The online discourse. It’s highly entertaining. If you thought Nolan’s film was a popcorn-worthy spectacle, wait until you see the online battle between critics and academics. They don’t fight with swords and arrows. No – their chosen method of attack (and defence) is the dreaded “opinion piece”.
SPOILER WARNING: This post will contain mild spoilers for a 3,000 year old story.
The problem: is The Odyssey a good interpretation?
Most of us have a vague notion of what happens in the Odyssey. We know it is an epic story from insert-big-number-here BC. There’s a guy in a boat called Odysseus, who goes to different islands, meets new people and fights monsters. It’s like One Piece for the ancient Greeks, but with lots more sex. At least, that’s as much as I knew when I went to the cinema a few weeks ago.
I don’t think my lack of knowledge was in any way detrimental to my enjoyment of the film. In fact, judging by the comments I’ve seen from outraged Homer experts, my lack of knowledge probably enhanced my experience (I thought he liked donuts). There were even a few occasions where my partner and I turned to each other to share dawning realisations such as “oh, this is where sirens are from” because, yes, we’re plebeians, and we never had the chance to study classics at our ordinary British state schools. I was in no position to judge whether Nolan’s interpretation was faithful to the source material. I could only judge whether I enjoyed the film or not – and I did.
But does a good film make a good interpretation? How many liberties can directors take with their source material before audiences start feeling ripped off or deceived? Several academics have voiced their views since the release of Nolan’s re-telling of Homer’s Odyssey, and in this post, I want to determine whether there is any consensus, or any sense at all, in their arguments for whether his interpretation landed.
Some historical context for my fellow plebeians
The Odyssey was created around 700 BC and, like its sister poem, the Iliad, it is commonly attributed to Homer – although we can’t be sure who first came up with these stories. Homer’s Odyssey is a poem, and it was first written down in “Homeric Greek” – a dialect that borrowed from lots of other dialects in the region, including those that were already archaic at the time. This way of writing was only used for poetry; nobody ever spoke in the way that the Odyssey was written. The story was probably told by poets for decades before anyone decided to record it, and these poets would have made changes and additions of their own.
The first translation into English was in the 17th century, but there have been many more since then. The most influential translation in recent years is by Emily Wilson, a classics professor at Pennsylvania University, who published her interpretation of the poem in 2017. Wilson was the first woman to translate the work, and her book was critically acclaimed and regarded as a fresh perspective, free of the unconscious (and conscious) misogyny of previous translations. She made the poem more accessible by using relatively simple words, avoiding the grandiose language of earlier works. Nolan cited her first line – “tell me about a complicated man” – as an inspiration for his film.
The academic mudslinging begins
After Nolan named Wilson as an inspiration for his work, her book sales reportedly increased by 600% on Audible. However, soon after The Odyssey released, she wrote a scathing review in the London Review of Books. One of her complaints was that Nolan had taken all the sex out of the story. For example, in the original, Calypso the nymph keeps Odysseus as a prisoner for seven years, has a lot of sex with him, and is angry that the other gods eventually take him away from her, pointing out the double-standard that male gods can have sex with whoever they want. In Nolan’s film, Calypso keeps Odysseus on the island for seven years, while purportedly trying to help him get over his PTSD from the Trojan War using memory-wiping lotus flowers. Wilson appears to view this re-framing as a reduction in Calypso’s agency and complexity – which, she argues, makes The Odyssey a poor interpretation.
Wilson also complains that Nolan did not include real gods. In her words: “Zeus’ law is portrayed as being crucially important, and yet there is no Zeus.” She states this as if it was a huge detriment to the story. However, in the narrative that Nolan has chosen to present, the inclusion of all-powerful gods would have caused additional confusion. Instead, he creates a more down-to-Earth, human-centric story to which modern audiences can easily relate. This change isn’t necessarily a bad choice, as Wilson seems to suggest – but it is certainly Nolan’s own interpretation, different from the original.
Wilson’s general take, for those that can’t be bothered to read her 4,000 word take-down, can be summarised in one of her closing, pithy remarks: “The writing is abysmal. None of the characters has convincing motivation for their actions or words. There are no sex scenes, and all the food looks horrible.” Based on these four apparently crucial stipulations, she decrees that The Odyssey is a poor interpretation.
To me, the most surprising aspect of Wilson’s review is how personal the attacks are. Early on, she announces that “unlike some of Nolan’s other films, The Odyssey is not boring” – as if she was itching to drag his name through the mud. Don’t get me wrong: I’m not a big Nolan fan either. But if I was a respected academic, writing in a respected outlet (rather than on a silly little blog), I’d rein in my language and keep my criticism on-target. Later, Wilson says that the dialogue in the film is so bad that “I would be ashamed to have written any part of this”. And yes, the dialogue is pretty bad in places – but why should we care that Wilson would be ashamed? Her phrasing here, placing herself at the centre of this criticism, makes it sound as if she is the one true arbiter of Homer’s work: as if Nolan had no right to make his own interpretation.
Meanwhile, other academics took a different view
I had to dig for some time to find reviews from other experts and academics; most of the online discourse has focussed on Wilson’s incendiary take-down because of its obvious entertainment value. However, I managed to find a few others, and they were far more restrained by comparison, and displayed a remarkable consensus.
In an opinion piece for The Guardian, Dr Emily Hauser suggests that Nolan’s interpretation of Odysseus as a lone, traumatised warrior tells us more about Nolan’s views of heroism and masculinity than it does about Homer’s Odyssey. She notes that the ancient Greeks would not have celebrated or explored remorse for victories achieved through violence, but she accepts that Nolan’s interpretation is valid, as he is writing for modern audiences, and is entitled to put his own spin on an old story.
In a review for the Society for Classical Studies blog, Professor Rachel Lesser, from Gettysburg College, also suggests that Nolan has presented a modern, male-centric view of Homer’s Odyssey, reducing the contributions of female characters in order to focus on Odysseus’ trauma. However, she acknowledges that the film is impressive for its practical effects and action sequences, making it much more of a crowd-pleaser than if Nolan had tried to adapt the original poem word-for-word.
Finally, Professor Armand D’Angour, from Oxford University, expresses a similar sentiment in his review. He acknowledges that Nolan has modified the source material in order to streamline the narrative and put his own spin on the story – and although he predicts that this may offend devout Homer fans, he knows that wider audiences will enjoy it.
The connecting thread between all of these reviews is that the experts know how impossible it would be to recreate the original story with no modifications. They accept that the story must be adapted to have mass appeal, and they also accept that making changes does not equal instant failure. An interpretation of a classic story is just that: an interpretation. Nolan was entitled to make minor changes while still calling his film The Odyssey.
The mudslinging intensifies
Let’s return to Wilson’s review. Why did she consider Nolan’s interpretation to be such a failure? Critics and academics were quick to weigh in with their own opinions.
Joyce Carol Oates, a retired humanities professor from Princeton University, thought that Wilson had been unduly harsh, accusing her of “haughty superiority” and of using the “crude language of MAGA folks” – just when you thought this couldn’t get political. Bizarrely, Oates didn’t like Nolan’s film much either; she apparently preferred the Hallmark TV films made in 1997, despite them being cheesy and low-budget.
Dr Theo Nash, who has written books on Homer’s poems, then wrote an article for Slate, criticising Wilson’s apparent gatekeeping of a 3,000-year-old story. In his article, he points out that Wilson lambasted Nolan simply for deviating from the original text, even though artists are entitled to their own personal interpretations. He argues that Wilson entirely overlooked one of the key themes of Nolan’s film, which is the relationship between guests and hosts. The breach of trust between visitors in strangers’ houses leads to conflict in every setting – in Troy, on each island, and back home on Ithaca – and throughout the film, Nolan suggests that this breakdown in civility will lead to the collapse of society. Wilson failed to comment on this key tenet of Nolan’s interpretation, and instead doubled down on how it deviated from the original.
Wilson tried to defend herself, of course. She responded to the counter-criticism with counter-counter-criticism on Bluesky, where she declared “the oddest thing about the response to this essay is people who say it’s ‘personal’. You can disagree about some or all of it! I may well be wrong!” Again, she seems to have missed the point. If you criticise a film by stating that YOU would be ashamed to have written it, you have set yourself up as the gatekeeper. The only reason anyone would care about your personal shame is if you were some sort of authority figure. And yes, Wilson is almost certainly an authority on Homer’s Odyssey – but that doesn’t automatically make her the authority on good interpretations.
Eventually, the drama went so viral that even The Onion waded in with the headline: “Translator Of Original ‘Minions’ Epic Poem Slams ‘Sexless, Bloodless’ Film Adaptation”. You know you have a problem when The Onion starts mocking you.
So, what makes a good interpretation?
Let’s set aside the drama to return to the matter at hand. What can The Odyssey tell us about the dangers of re-imagining classic stories? I doubt that Nolan was worried about offending a handful of academics. He was presumably more concerned with telling a tale of epic proportions (and translating this epicness into the run-time, sound effects volume and screen size). Most critics and cinema-goers seem to have enjoyed his offering, so it looks as if he succeeded: he made a good film. But is that the same as a good interpretation? And if everyone is entitled to their own interpretation, can they even be judged as good or bad?
Adaptation always requires modification
We’ve all seen film adaptations of novels, comic books and stage plays, and we expect that liberties will be taken with the source material. For example, sacrifices are often made in order to fit books, which take several hours to read, into two-hour films. Sometimes the opposite is true, with certain films adding material to reach their two-hour target runtime (this didn’t work so well with the dual-film adaptation of Wicked, originally a 90-minute Broadway musical).
There is always some degree of interpretation when translating one medium into another. Even if most of the information from the original remains intact (e.g., character names or plot points), there is always scope for a personal spin (e.g., costume design or how characters sound). Some books readily translate to the big screen (e.g., The Hunger Games), so relatively little interpretation is needed – the director doesn’t need to select a key theme to underpin the screenplay, because the themes can be lifted straight from the book. However, some books are more complex, making them harder for directors to wrangle into a cohesive film (David Lynch’s Dune (1985) is a prime example of this). If the source material has a densely woven mesh of plots and themes, these may unravel when a director chooses to embellish one thread at the expense of another. Perhaps this is what leads to a “bad” interpretation?
Some books are far too dense to bring to the big screen in their entirety. Frank Herbert’s Dune is an obvious example; so is Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy. And I’ll probably annoy a few people by suggesting that Peter Jackson’s adaptation of Lord of the Rings streamlined and elevated the original story by making changes to the source material. It would have been infeasible to contain all the details of Tolkien’s sprawling Middle Earth into nine hours, but the liberties that Jackson took with the plot, pacing and character dialogue led to millions of people loving these films – including fans of the original books.
A good interpretation, then, doesn’t equate to an entirely faithful adaptation. Instead, the most important factor is whether the film interpretation stays true to the soul of the original. Even if the dialogue changes, or the plot is modified, or certain characters are excluded, the audience can still recognise and enjoy the magic from the source material, then happily consume it in its new and different form.
Consider the scope of the interpretation
Sometimes, interpretations are boldly distinct from their source material. For example, there have been various left-field interpretations of Shakespeare plays over the years, from She’s The Man (Twelfth Night) to Disney’s The Lion King (Hamlet). I don’t think anyone particularly minded that these weren’t faithful to the original plays. There have also been multiple interpretations of Homer’s Odyssey, including The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie (2004) – and where were the academic mudslingers then?
There are two factors at play here. Firstly, the age of the source material. If a story has been around for long enough, it becomes public domain, open for copying and incorporation into other forms of art. Also, if a story is decades or centuries old, you are unlikely to insult the creator, or their descendants, by writing a new interpretation. For example, you could set it in space (e.g., Treasure Planet), or make 80% of the characters singing puppets (e.g., Muppet Treasure Island).
Secondly, the scope of the interpretation matters. There is a fuzzy threshold between interpretations evidently detached from the original (e.g., Pride and Prejudice and Zombies), and interpretations that retain stronger links to the source material (e.g., Pride and Prejudice, 2005). Nolan’s The Odyssey falls into a grey area, where it looks like it could be a word-for-word film retelling of the epic poem, but is instead a streamlined and modernised interpretation of only a few themes from the original. In short, it is close enough to Homer’s story for the Homer gatekeepers to start complaining that it isn’t actually close enough.
Finally – is there such thing as a bad interpretation?
Interpretations are like opinions. Whether they are bad or good is decided by public consensus. A few academics complaining that Nolan wasn’t faithful enough to the source material doesn’t mean that he made a bad adaptation. Millions of people have enjoyed his film and the story he decided to tell. If it wasn’t quite the same as Homer’s story – so what? Homer was writing for audiences 3,000 years ago. Nolan is writing for people today, who have different perspectives and concerns. It makes sense to emphasize the themes that will resonate today, and diminish the archaic themes that are no longer understood. Go ahead and emphasize Odysseus’ guilt, to get modern audiences to consider the morals of war. Go ahead and remove Odysseus’ merciless killing of female slaves, to avoid normalising misogyny. These are understandable and acceptable changes.
I think Nolan’s interpretation was a solid and entertaining offering. Yes, the dialogue was clunky – but the rest of the film was such a spectacle that I could look past it. Yes, Nolan chose to tell a story about a man doing man things and suffering man emotions, at the expense of downgrading the female characters – but again, this didn’t bother me. That’s the story Nolan wanted to tell. He did a good job of it. You can’t ask the man to do everything, and I’m happy when Nolan sticks to his strengths. We don’t need him writing another aggrieved mother character (I wish I could forget Tenet but I can’t).
In summary…
The quality of an interpretation is a matter of personal taste. Everyone interprets and imagines things differently, and it’s always nice when a director’s vision aligns well with your own. You get that buzz of satisfaction when you see an object or person on the big screen that you previously only held in your mind: a sense of “yes – that’s exactly what I thought it should look like!” Despite never reading Homer’s Odyssey, I knew enough about it to feel that buzz when I saw the cyclops, the giants, and the island of Ithaca. Nolan captured the Odyssey’s sense of action and adventure, if nothing else. I’d call it a good interpretation, but I’m sure others would disagree – and that’s fine.
Happy reading, and have a lovely week!
My sources:
https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v48/n14/emily-wilson/an-uncomplicated-man
https://www.theguardian.com/film/2026/jul/15/the-odyssey-christopher-nolan-classicists-verdict
https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2026-07-20-expert-comment-is-christopher-nolans-odyssey-faithful-to-homer
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