I watched the Odyssey in regular plebeian 45 mm on Monday. It was good! I honestly went into the movie thinking that potentially, I might fall asleep. Why did i think this you might ask? Despite the mostly positive reviews and the movie being deemed the "movie of the year" I saw one tiktok post that greatly influenced my expectations.

From my memory, the post was from someone that went to Juliard and had a lot of experience with the theater, epics, and roman/greek theater? She said that while she enjoyed the film, she didn't think Gen Z/X would make it through the film because of dying attention spans, the greco-roman-ish script, and a few other points that I'm hazy recollecting. What I remember the most, was how she said if you could make it to Circe's part of the movie then the rest was good, but the parts before Circe's part had potentially to cause some snoozing.

I think that person was wrong!

There was a group of obnoxious teens sitting behind me (im sorry if i sound like a grumpy old person but hear me out). I say they were obnoxious teens despite not being able to see them because they came and purposefully caused a disturbance. Although they weren't extremely loud or causing a large disturbance, they did not have pure intent in their words and manner of speech. Anyway, although they were kinda shouting "oMg iM sO sCaReD!" at the beginning of the movie, it seemed like they were engaged with the entirety of the film (although there were still loud, distracting, remarks here and there but pretty minimal). Although I couldn't see them, I'm pretty sure they were Gen X/ younger side of Gen Z.

I too was engaged and enjoyed the entire film. The movie made me uncomfortable at certain scenes and delighted in others, which is great! I think most reaction besides, "man this kinda sucks" is a win.

Now after watching the movie and my experience with those teens, i think that person whose video commentary super influenced me was wrong. I've been thinking that wow, i really assumped the worse abt my and the younger generation. It was so easy to agree that yea, these younger folks aren't going to enjoy/ be able to sit through such a long retelling of an old story. It was easy to take what this seemingly reputable person was saying as fact rather than an personal opinion. I'm reminded of my mom who cites every youtube video as fact. I am becoming my mom (lololol).

I do want to say, the odyssey isn't perfect. It was a good movie but i don't know if it was one of the greatest or even great retelling? I was looking forward to "Nobody blinded me!"! I also think this retelling of the Odyssey flattens Odysseus. He's prideful! He sometimes purposefully puts his men in harms way! He's also pretty selfish and narcissistic! He is simply clever. Nolan's retelling got rid of the fact he stays on Circe's island for a year and becomes her lover willingly. Why is he this selfless man whose trying to save his beastly crew from their own fate when he is also a beast, just one with a damn brain.

Side rant: Nolan should've talked to Madeline Miller about how to portray Circe. That would've made me like the film 100x more. Miller made me fall in love with Circe and her myths. The movie just made me feel like a man took a powerful and independent goddess and made her a cruel, wicked, misandrist. Never trust Christopher Nolan to make a multi-dimensional lady. Ugh.

Overall, great movie but not great retelling. But this kinda was what I expected from a Christopher Nolan film. It was beautiful with great sound track. The blend of modern speech with the poem was weird though. Travis Scott took me out of the story, sorry. I loved Lupita Nyong'o as Helena and how they portrayed her though! Also i wish they portrayed him going crazy at the end but I didn't think they would/ i understood why they did not. Also I do truly hate to say it, Zendaya as Athena was off-putting to me. Love Zendaya, truly, but for me I don't see Athena. Maybe it's the age? I always assumed Athena would be a god that would allow traces age to show in her appearance, a sign of her wisdom maybe?

Tldr: Loved the movie, have some thoughts but was good!

#rant