The Odyssey (An Eventually Humorous Article)

The Odyssey (An Eventually Humorous Article)

 

So, this will be an abnormally loooooong article as it was an abnormally loooooong film owing largely to the fact that it is an epic and by law epic movies have to be at least 3 hours long. The same is true for articles about epics! So just save all your hate mail complaining about it ‘cause it is what it is’!

 

Christopher Nolan, the director of such momentous films such as Batman Begins, 

Dunkirk, Interstellar, Inception (to me, one of the BEST movies ever made), Oppenheimer, and The Dark Knight- the Batman movie that is the height of Batmanism everywhere.

 

It is nice to see a truly epic movie made again and Nolan is just the guy to do it. The last true epics I remember being made was the Lord of the Rings Trilogy. These were true masterpieces although ALL of them were a bit too long. Epic though they were, they made one wish for a quicker and more merciful ending for we viewers. As far as the Hobbit movies went- when they made a trilogy out of a book that was shorter than any one of the three Lord books it was overkill and I was not that impressed by reading it in the first place, so I didn’t bother with them.

 

Now Nolan has chosen to make a film out of what is considered to be perhaps the greatest written epic of all time- the Odyssey by Homer, the possibly blind Greek poet. Not much is known about him, but his two epics- the Iliad and the Odyssey, are considered to be among the greatest classics of world literature.

The Odysseyis the alleged adventures of a battle leader named Odysseus who was the architect of the takeover of the city of Troy that had been going on for ten years. He and his men made a Trojan horse ‘gift’ for the Turks. The Greeks pretended to depart, leaving what appeared to be a present of a giant statue of a horse. What they didn’t know was it had him and his men hiding inside. Once the ‘present’ had been drug inside, the Greeks inside waited until nightfall, then crawled out of the horse and upended the gates to the city letting their own men in to attack and overcome the Turkish troops there.

 

Personally, to tell you the real truth, if I had just sacked the richest town in Asia Minor and had a wife like Anne Hathaway, I would have just gone back home after Troy and saved myself another 10 years of wandering, a lot of pain and bloodshed and just returned home and retired. It would have also saved Homer the bother of writing about all of it too!

 

Now, of course, had I, being who I am, made the movie it would have come out significantly different. For instance, in the scenes where Charlize Theron is in them portraying Calypso, the seductive nymph who promises Odysseus immortality and lots of fun under the sheets if he stays with her. So, were I the director I would have her in a bikini for all her scenes but that is because I am a shameless letch and it is, well……CHARLIZE THERON after all!!!!! Now I know bikinis were not invented yet in this time period and if she had one despite that and wore it she probably would have been stoned for it. 

 

Of course, in keeping with the story I would have Ody boy leave her like it was in the book, but then I would cheat and write myself into the story as the next sap that she seduces (Oh JOY!)

 

For that matter, because I am insatiable, I would also have Anne Hathaway in a bikini as well but only when she is behind the screen weaving so that the suitors trying to marry her would not get over excited and rip through the screens to get at her. She probably could have gotten away with bikini wearing because she was a Queen after all, and also, her husband wasn’t around to stop her. 

 

Then, when it comes to the scene where Odysseus’s crew has to sail through the Strait where the sirens are and all the sailors except Ody put wax in their ears to keep from being tempted by their seductions. Ody has himself tied to the mast waxless to suffer through the ordeal of their siren songs that supposed drive men made mad with lust for them. Now Nolan missed an Oscar winning chance by NOT depicting the sirens in his movie, just their songs. In my version I would actually SHOW the sirens on the rocks which Nolan didn’t and rip the wax out of my ears and go join them. I would have them all done up AI-ish like versions of Sophia Loren, Raquel Welch, Julie Newmar, Pamela Anderson, Ursula Andress or any other Sex Goddesses in skimpy, wet clinging clothes to whom I would swim and let them work their evil upon me. Oh, Sweet Sacrifice!

 

I would have also had the actors at least TRY to do a Greek accent. As one of the few flaws in the movie (along with the no see ‘em Sirens) the actors all sound like the places they were raised on were various locals on the American East Coast.

 

The scene in the cave with the Cyclops eating Ody’s men alive would have been more palatable if the Cyclops were wearing a bib that would catch at least some of the gore and entrails falling out its mouth during snack time!  Yuck! I bet he doesn’t get invited to a lot of parties. And to poke the poor creature in his only eye was really low, even if he did eat a couple of your buddies as snacks…..gruesomely…..

 

I mean- was that REALLY necessary! The poor guy only had one eye to begin with. And with that mouth wash colored blue skin of his and his crooked nose that is at a really wrong angle on his mug what chances did he have of being considered a must- have bachelor by any of the local women for God’s sake. Not to mention his being 20 feet tall! And the poor guy was living in a cave, crying out loud! How was he going to meet anyone there?

 

There would have been a much more simple and definitely less painful way for Odysseus to rid his palace of the suitors out to marry his supposed widow. All he would have had to do was poison their wine and their constantly available food. It seems all they ever did was hang out at his castle and drool over his wifey. Then Odysseus wouldn’t have had to suffer the beatings he took from them and the one on ones he had with them when he finally did return. He also would have had two arrows less in his back as well.

 

The witch Circe turning Odysseus’s sailors into pigs was a lousy idea. Rowing the boat was hard enough for them without having to hold onto the oar with pigs feet. Also, as pigs they would have probably eaten the oars.

 

The attack by the giant knights on the island where they searched for food would have gone a lot better if, instead of macho-like fighting them right away, if they had gone immediately back to the ships and taken off they would have been a lot better off. Then, if the silvered knights had foolishly followed them they would have drowned in the sea in those huge suits of armor they were wearing. Or at least rusted so badly afterwards that they were sealed inside!

 

Anyway, it took Odysseus 20 years to get back to his home. 20 years…….????? Really? Didn’t they have buses or trains back then? Did he lose his search app on his I-phone. What about a compass????? What did you say? They didn’t even have those back then? Sheesh! HOPELESS!!!!!!