The Odyssey (Christopher Nolan, 2026)

[therewillbeblus]

First Trailer

[domino harvey]

Is this the same theatrical teaser people were raving about? Because, uh, I don’t get it

[therewillbeblus]

I heard the theatrical one was an entire scene from the film, like they did with the opening six minutes of The Dark Knight as a promotion

[The Elegant Dandy Fop]

This trailer played on 70mm before my screening of Marty Supreme on Saturday. I believe the extended trailer/prologue was exclusive to IMAX screenings of Avatar and the encores of Sinners and One Battle After Another on IMAX 70mm.

[Matt]

I’m not sure if I’m ready for another grimly serious Nolan movie. Inception and Tenet have silly premises but pull them off by taking them seriously. And of course The Dark Knight has Heath Ledger’s terrifying but truly funny Joker. If this can manage to bring a little sword-and-sandal levity to the proceedings, it might be good. The lotus eaters and the Circe parts of the book could add some lightness, but I can also see Nolan skipping over those as inessential detours from the main action.

[Walter Kurtz]

I bet it's going to be more akin to Dunkirk with Damon being Hardy-serious only more so once he finds out his wife has "suitors". I much prefer Mrs. Miniver to Dunkirk.

[Mr Sausage]

I fully expect Nolan to use the famously non-linear source to cross cut between different time lines and create a melange of intersecting events ala Oppenheimer.

[Altair]

Yes, surely Oppenheimer is the clearest point of comparison here - indeed Tenet is the only non-historical film he's made in the last decade. Now that he has carte blanche, Nolan is cleary drawn to animating the existential stakes of the past.

[Peacock]

Matt - I too hope the Lotus Eaters don’t get skipped over but there’s no way Circe isn’t included! That’s one of the most famous parts of the story. (Edit: just checked and it seems like Charlize Theron is playing her)

[Mr Sausage]

For such a foundational work of story telling, has there ever been a great film adaptation of The Odyssey?

[knives]

O Brother Where Art Thou? or maybe The Spongebob Movie.

[domino harvey]

O Brother Where Art Thou?

My least favorite Coen Bros film!

I do think it’s odd that we don’t have more media based on Greek mythology anymore. You’d think television series with few broadcast boundaries would be a natural fit for a story of the week approach, but apparently not

[Mr Sausage]

O Brother Where Art Thou? or maybe The Spongebob Movie.

Kinda says everything that you have to turn to heavily displaced versions.

Did anyone see the Fiennes/Binoche version, The Return? Seemed promising.

[Peacock]

I haven’t watched it yet myself, but I have the Kirk Douglas Odyssey here to check out, it’s meant to be pretty decent!

[knives]

O Brother Where Art Thou?

My least favorite Coen Bros film!

I do think it’s odd that we don’t have more media based on Greek mythology anymore. You’d think television series with few broadcast boundaries would be a natural fit for a story of the week approach, but apparently not

There’s always Percy Jackson. Not to be trite, but I do feel a lot of the superhero media has superseded the myths and legends because of how easily they can be set in the now.

[Mr Sausage]

The Thor movies have at least been giving Norse mythology quite a workout.

[knives]

Just why I decided to leave it as myths rather than Greek.

[Guido]

For such a foundational work of story telling, has there ever been a great film adaptation of The Odyssey?

Haven’t seen it yet, and have no sense of its scope, but Franco Piavoli’s Nostos: The Return seems like an idiosyncratic take.

[domino harvey]

I haven’t watched it yet myself, but I have the Kirk Douglas Odyssey here to check out, it’s meant to be pretty decent!

That one’s indeed not bad for what it is

[zedz]

I fully expect Nolan to use the famously non-linear source to cross cut between different time lines and create a melange of intersecting events ala Oppenheimer.

The temptation would generally be to smooth everything out, but if anybody were going to adhere to the narrative structure of the original, it would be Nolan. Which is a plus. The source also plays into Nolan's preference for wall-to-wall expository dialogue, which isn't.

Maybe I'm blanking something, but has Nolan ever directed a scene as gory as the killing of the suitors? As written, it's the splatteriest of splatter movies, and the abrupt tonal shift is jarring.

[domino harvey]

The Joker slammed a pencil in some guy’s eye

[knives]

A burned another guy alive. I think that film is the strongest violence he’s featured.

[Mr Sausage]

Doesn’t Following have a guy getting his fingers and then skull smashed with a hammer? And Memento starts with a gory headshot where we watch the guy’s brains and skull fragments surge back together in a reverse shot.

[hearthesilence]

I can't remember if there was anything in Dunkirk like a gory horror movie, but it's tremendously violent, driving home the simple, brutal point that warfare's immediate aim is to slaughter as many human beings as quickly and efficiently as possible.

[therewillbeblus]

It's also PG-13, like most of his movies over the last two decades