Christopher Nolan's ancient Greek epic The Odyssey has opened in Russian cinemas through unauthorised parallel import, as the three-hour blockbuster nears the global box office record for an R-rated release.
The film, which stars Matt Damon as the King of Ithaca, has generated more than half of the 1.33 billion dollars it needs to surpass Deadpool and Wolverine during its first two weeks in theatres worldwide.
Russian venues are screening standard copies of the feature rather than homemade versions created by amputating Kazakh subtitles. The country lacks access to the authentic 70-millimetre film prints, which are being shown in just 40 cinemas globally, half of them in the United States.
Nolan has faced accusations of elitism and gatekeeping over the limited 70-millimetre release, which critics labelled a compromised version for standard cinemas. However, film critic Pavel Voronkov, writing in Gazeta.Ru, noted the picture loses no critical visual information on normal screens.
The adaptation of Homer's poem features an extensive ensemble cast. Anne Hathaway plays Odysseus's wife Penelope, while Tom Holland portrays his young son Telemachus. Charlize Theron features as the nymph Calypso, alongside Robert Pattinson and Corey Hawkins as suitors attempting to marry Penelope.
Box office success defies backlash
The film's financial performance has confounded online critics involved in culture wars who predicted a box office failure due to the casting of transgender actor Elliot Page and Lupita Nyong'o. Nyong'o plays both Queen Helen, who has been returned to Sparta following the fall of Troy, and her sister Clytemnestra.
Following his massive success with Oppenheimer, Nolan was given a blank cheque to make the picture, which was shot entirely on IMAX cameras using practical effects on location. Voronkov stated that Nolan successfully shoots his IMAX arrow through all 12 rings, aided by the gods. Every penny of the massive budget is visible on screen, and the production even managed to capture real dolphins jumping into frame during shooting.
The director has wanted to make a feature completely on IMAX since seeing documentaries in the format as a teenager at the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago almost 40 years ago. Nolan, who does not own a smartphone, designed the immersive spectacle to make audiences forget their own devices for the duration of the film.
Complex veteran
According to Nolan, he drew on a recent English translation of the poem by University of Pennsylvania professor Emily Wilson to write the screenplay. Wilson chose not to overcomplicate the language and refused to soften the text, using the word slaves rather than servants. A similar approach was taken by Grigory Starikovsky in his Russian translation of Homer published last year.
Voronkov said the director turned the classic text into a direct anti-war statement featuring quotes from Elem Klimov's Soviet war film Come and See. He portrays the famously cunning Odysseus as a complex, ambiguous veteran suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder.
Wilson has viewed the film and criticised Nolan for failing to write realistic people with clear desires, arguing that his female characters in particular suffer from clunky dialogue. The scholar, who Voronkov noted categorises blockbusters as teenage entertainment, also expressed dissatisfaction with Nolan's handling of the original text.
She accused him of watering down the mythological elements. Bill Irwin's cyclops Polyphemus is depicted as a giant kaiju monster, while the trauma of the sorceress Circe, played by Samantha Morton, is only briefly outlined, and Calypso's motivations remain vague. However, Wilson acknowledged the adaptation's impressive visual spectacle.
Supporters of Nolan argue the director combines the precision of Stanley Kubrick with the sentimentality of Steven Spielberg. The filmmaker's wife, Emma Thomas, produces all of his films, and defenders suggest his work reflects the fears of a devoted husband terrified of losing the love of his life.
Two decades in the making
The production incorporates ideas Nolan first developed 20 years ago when he was attached to direct an adaptation of the Iliad. That project was eventually handed to Wolfgang Petersen, who became available after a Batman and Superman film was cancelled, to become the 2004 feature Troy.
Nolan was instead sent to direct Batman Begins, but Voronkov highlighted that The Odyssey retains visual concepts from his original work, including a striking image of a wooden horse sinking into sand.
The narrative picks up eight years after the fall of Troy. The surviving victors have left the cursed shores and returned to their families, but Odysseus remains trapped on the island of Ogygia with Calypso following his long wanderings at sea.
In Ithaca, Penelope delays a new wedding and resists the demands of numerous suitors who have occupied her home, hoping her husband is still alive. Telemachus, tired of watching the suitors' hedonism and deceit, shares her belief and sets out to find his father.
He hopes to save the island from remaining without a ruler amid frightening rumours of bloodthirsty sea people trampling the law of Zeus.
Escalating conflict
Voronkov said Nolan streamlines the mythological journey, sacrificing some material to Scylla rather than letting the whole film perish in Charybdis. The critic added that the editing mess of the film's first hour is redeemed by a crushing flashback to the Trojan war which brilliantly reveals the goddess Athena, played by Zendaya.
The flashback answers critics who felt the film smoothed over the brutalities of war. Similar criticism was levelled at Oppenheimer for omitting the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which Voronkov argued was ultimately unnecessary as audiences were gripped by the eschatological horror of the bomb test and the casual discussion of which Japanese cities to attack.
The narrative explores the thematic question of what kind of world will be left to punish children when their turn comes. The focus continues Nolan's career-long exploration of the catastrophic culmination of war.
His previous films depicted humanity getting a second chance after Earth was doomed in Interstellar, and heroes trying to escape the three-element meat grinder of Dunkirk across earth, water and air in overlapping time streams of a week, a day and an hour. In Tenet, the protagonists attempted to prevent a war while waging it, and in Oppenheimer, the central character realised he had launched the countdown to a nuclear hell.
However, Voronkov described Nolan's anti-war statement in The Odyssey as somewhat conservative. Critics have questioned his muddy political stance since his Batman trilogy, which was viewed as a reaction to the September 11 attacks and the iron fist of state control.
The critic noted the director condemns the offensive war against the Trojans, but does not apply the same categoric opposition to the defensive conflict against Penelope's suitors. The stance contrasts with Michael Sarnoski's more radical thriller The Death of Robin Hood, which Hugh Jackman chose to star in after declining the role of Odysseus, though Voronkov pointed out that film was largely ignored by the general public.
