Film Review - The Odyssey (2026)

The Odyssey is based off of the book by Homer and concerns the voyage of Odysseus (Matt Damon) as he tries to make it back home to Ithica and his beloved wife Penelope (Anne Hathaway) who is now having to court various suitors including Antinous (Robert Pattinson) meanwhile his son Telemachus (Tom Holland) wants to know more about what happened to him and sets off on his own quest to find out.

The Odyssey was one of my most anticipated movies of the year firstly because of director Christopher Nolan who’s last 3 films (Oppenheimer, Tenet and Dunkirk) have been my favourites of his after his first 2 Batman films and that group of films in particular showed me what a great filmmaker he was after The Dark Knight Rises and Interstellar got swallowed up by the ambition of those films getting away from him but 3 hits in a row can’t guarantee a 4th right.

Well not exactly but that said this is a really enjoyable film and a great time at the cinema for sure and first off this movie is very well crafted, Nolan’s direction is as assured and grand as ever and it’s a real treat to watch him craft a movie and see it unfold in front of you on a big cinema screen, Jennifer Lame’s editing is excellent and Nolan made a great choice hiring her in 2020 to edit Tenet as it really feels like she understands how his directing rhythms work and how to make it feel accessible and understandable to an audience which sometimes hasn’t been the case with Nolan’s films, the production design is top notch as is the costume design by Ellen Mirojnick (that Agamenon armour is superb and reminds me of something out of Batman.)

Oh and Ludwig Gorannson delivers yet another excellent score in this movie, another great hire Nolan brought in on Tenet that like Jennifer Lame in the editing room understands how to make Nolan’s work shine and don’t get me wrong both Lee Smith and Hans Zimmer did good work with Nolan in those roles but Lame and Gorannson have more than earnt their place at his side and I haven’t really missed their work with him since.

And then there is the cast who all deliver excellent work, Damon might be the centre of the film but he only feels like a central piece of a large ensemble and that works really well, Anne Hathaway and John Leguizamo deserve Oscar nominations for their work here as they are very good in their roles (and watching Hathaway in this movie really showed how much she has matured as an actress over the years), Tom Holland delivers great work as Telemachus while Jon Bernthal is a lot of fun as Menelaus and Elliot Page/Lupita Nyong’o/Corey Hawkins/Himesh Patel/Mia Goth/Samantha Morton/Benny Safdie and Charlize Theron make the most of the limited screen time and smaller roles (Page in particular looks like Pattinson’s relative as they both have similar facial structures and jawlines.)

Also this movie has some excellent set piece scenes as well, the Cyclops moment in the trailers looked okay but when you watch that scene in the cinema it turns into a terrifying moment that made me smile as did the scene with the giant metal knights that look like something from Denis Villenueve’s Dune trilogy and aren’t to be messed with lightly, there’s also a moment with food on an island that made me smile a lot and the final act climax is excellent and helps to bring the story to a satisfying end.

But if I do have one complaint about the film it’s that it tends to meander around at times as if the storytelling itself is lost at sea as much as Odysseus and his crew are and at nearly 3 hours in length you do feel it at times but when it all comes together at the end you feel more than satisfied.

And so that was the Odyssey and its not as good as those 5 other Nolan films I’ve mentioned above but this is still a great time in a cinema and a very enjoyable watch, 3 and a half out of 5.