诺兰用十年下的一盘大棋！万字解析《奥德赛》真正的内核，竟然是？
迷影至下Filmlast 2026-08-15 18:35:49
So, has everyone seen “The Odyssey”? Five seconds—share your thoughts!After watching The Odyssey,my strongest takeaway is that Nolan has, at last,woven together the core themes, that have recurred across his films for over twenty years.and packed it all, into a three thousand year old Ancient Greek epic.
takeaway:
a conclusion to be made based on presented facts or information : a main point or key message to be learned or understood from something experienced or observed
The takeaway is clear: cats are a growing environmental concern because they are driving down some native bird populations …
—Bruce Barcott
One of the main takeaways stressed by the panelists was that social media is about conversation, not just dissemination.
—Gabe Habash
In “Interstellar,” Cooper journeys across the cosmos, yearning to get home;in “Inception,” Cobb, trapped by memories and guilt,shares that same ultimate wish: to return to his children.“ Oppenheimer” tells of a man of vast intellect, who created something that changed the world.And only when that atomic bomb was deployed in battle, did he grasp what kind of door he’d opened.All these themes ultimately converge upon Odysseus.So, I think what makes “The Odyssey” truly great, isn’t just the visual spectacles—the Cyclops, Sirens, witches, and sea monster.Nolan spent nearly three hours filming a man who’d won a war,taking ten years to slowly come to terms, with what he’d actually done.
This radical subversion of Ancient Greece’s literary core—THAT is what makes “The Odyssey” truly brilliant.Hi all— Filmlast here!today, we shall fully break down, just how Nolan rewrote “The Odyssey”—and what those details in the film,easy to miss on a first watch, truly mean.and lastly, why did Nolan, turn this three millennia old heroic epic, into a modern, anti war film at its core?So, let’s cut to the chase!My shimmering water skills are limited—hit that Triple Combo to help me climb the ranks,then say bye bye!Let’s dive into today’s show: A Deep Dive into The Odyssey!The Odyssey is a long narrative epic from Ancient Greece, that, along with the Iliad,makes up what we now call the Homeric Epic.The Iliad unfolds during the Trojan War,whereas The Odyssey picks up right after the war’s end,chronicling Odysseus’s ten year drift, back to his homeland of Ithaca.Odysseus and Achilles, differ greatly from such strength based heroes.What makes him truly great is his mind—he can disguise himself,
lie, craft schemes,and knows how to exploit his foes’ psychology.the specific character ties,the original adventures, and the Greek mythology backdrop.My viewing preview from the eighth, covered this in great detail,so if you’re keen, go catch up on that first!Of course, this video—shot on my new phone from Zhuanzhuan—will be much smoother!This used iPhone fifteen Pro Max of mine, cost just over four thousand five hundred—what a steal!Only after comparing did I realize—Zhuanzhuan’s second hand goods are SO cheap!Phones that once cost thousands are now dirt cheap!Other Apple products on Zhuanzhuan are a great deal, too—you can snag an iPad eleven inch for around two grand,and snag an M four MacBook Air for just over four thousand, eight hundred!Anyway, from now on,I’m sticking to Zhuanzhuan for Apple products!Back to “The Odyssey”—what we aim to discuss today, is what changes Nolan made to this, almost universally known Western myth.Here’s the TL;DR: Nolan’s key tweak to “The Odyssey”.
is taking that Ancient Greek epic, that praises heroic wisdom and Homecoming,and recast it as a tale of war trauma,a long trial of civilization’s frontiers, and one’s own atonement.The Trojan Horse, Sinon, Athena,the Cyclops, Circe, the Sirens, and the final Homecoming—all pose the very same question:when one resorts to any means for victory,constantly deceives, and witnesses, countless sacrifices and violence,can they ever reclaim their former self?And when we look at The Odyssey, Dunkirk, and Oppenheimer, together, these three films make up Nolan’s war trilogy.which speak to survival in war,the power war creates,and the costs that linger long after it ends.Now, let’s step into Nolan’s world of “The Odyssey,”, film by film.First up: the very start of it all—the Trojan Horse.You’ve heard the tale of the Trojan Horse.In the traditional tale,the Trojan Horse ranks among Odysseus’s greatest feats;the Achaean Army laid siege for ten years,suffering countless casualties,
yet still couldn’t breach Troy.In the end, Odysseus resolved the war via a ruse:the Greeks feigned retreat,leaving behind a Trojan Horse with soldiers hidden inside,which the Trojans then hauled into their city.Come nightfall, the Greek soldiers, flung open the city gates from within;for those keen on this tale,do check out our deep dive breakdown of Troy,posted on the thirteenth.This tale has endured for millennia, because that stratagem was so brilliant—yet, the vibe Nolan’s film, gives off at its start feels very odd.The Trojan Horse lacks any sense of sacred victory;it’s hauled from the sea—heavy, damp,like a vast piece of war wreckage.According to Nolan himself,his visual reference was the rundown Statue of Liberty, from the original “Planet of the Apes”—a symbol of humanity’s ruined civilization.the Trojans expended great effort to haul, this so called gift to Athena,bit by bit, into their own city.The film even stresses that, to avoid damaging the Trojan Horse,
they laid down logs beneath it to let it inch forward slowly.And the Greeks inside the Trojan Horse, bore no semblance of legendary heroes
bear:
[T] ~ sth(formal) to show sth; to carry sth so that it can be seen 显示；带有
The document bore her signature.
文件上有她的签字。
He was badly wounded in the war and still bears the scars.
他在战争中负了重伤，现在还留有伤疤。
She bears little resemblance to (= is not much like) her mother.
她很不像她的母亲。
The title of the essay bore little relation to (= was not much connected with) the contents.
这篇文章的题目与内容很不相符
—they stayed within for so long, that some drowned from the tides.The rest huddled inside that dark, cramped wooden Space,forced to relieve themselves right where they stood.the Trojans probed the Trojan Horse with swords;one blade grazed a soldier—Menelaus swiftly clamped a hand over his mouth,while Odysseus wiped the blood from the blade.to keep those outside from finding out.Nolan took a tale whose outcome we all know, and infused it with suspense;yet, what’s more crucial about this scene, is the film’s redefinition of the Trojan Horse itself.So why would the Trojans drag such a suspect thing, into their own city?The film’s reason is clear:they truly believed the war was over.The Trojan Horse was posed as a gift to Athena—and the Greeks, and the Trojans worshipped many of the same gods.The war had raged for ten years;
their foes had departed, leaving but one offering by the sea—one they believed signaled a gesture of peace.So, they chose to honor the offering left by the other side, and brought it into their own city.And so, Odysseus’s way of winning the war, seemed all the more brutal.The film brings up a concept time and again:Zeus’ law—or Xenia in Ancient Greek culture—which denotes the etiquette between host and guest.When a stranger comes to one’s doorstep,the host should offer food and shelter,for who knows if that ragged figure, might have divine protection backing them?In turn, guests must not exploit their host’s kindness, to harm them.This whole thing is complex, yet also quite simple.In a nutshell: there must be basic trust between people—and Odysseus’s greatest military victory, hinged upon that very trust.the Trojans chose to trust the offering,thus accepting the Trojan Horse,and believing the war was over,they opened their city gates.They trusted that the Greeks would at least abide.
by the rules of the gods, both sides revered, so they didn’t burn the thing right away.In turn, their goodwill, became the gateway to their city’s demise.The film later has Odysseus admit himself, that he realized this:he finally grasped that what he breached with one lie, was far more than just the walls of Troy.That night, the most basic trust, between people—and the gods’ most fundamental rules—were all torn asunder.This handling instantly brought “Oppenheimer” to mind—the atomic bomb,surely, a marvel of human scientific genius.The Manhattan Project pulled off a near impossible tech feat.The Trojan Horse, too, was a near perfect military design.But the issue arises post creation:just how great something is, and what it ultimately brings to the world, have never been one and the same.Odysseus spent ten years winning the war,then another ten grasping his victory.And Nora felt that this layer of sin, wasn’t quite tangible enough,so he reshaped a minor figure from the original: Sinon.
Sinon’s arc marks one of the film’s, biggest tweaks to the original myth.In later versions, like Virgil’s The Aeneid,Sinon was part of the ruse from the start.He stayed by the Trojan Horse,using lies to persuade the Trojans, that the Greek army had retreated—but then, with Nolan, things grew even darker.Sinon himself was duped by Odysseus—he had no clue Greek soldiers hid inside the Trojan Horse;he truly believed that horse was a gift for the Trojans.Why did Odysseus do this?Because a lie one believes, oneself is, of course, the most convincing one to tell.The more Sinon believed his own words,the more easily the Trojans were duped.In other words, in this military marvel hailed for millennia,Odysseus turned his own soldiers into props, too.Plus, the film fleshed out Sinon’s backstory.Before the battle, it was Antinous, who actually drew the conscription lot,yet Sinon went to the battlefield in his stead,on the condition that Antinous would look after, Sinon’s family.
As it turned out, Antinous fared well,but his promise was never kept,and Sinon’s father ended up dying in poverty.So, when Odysseus met Sinon again in the Underworld,this figure grew suddenly vital.For it stands for those folks often overlooked in war epics—history will recall who devised the Trojan Horse,who breached Troy, and which king won the war.But most who were sent to die, might be left with just a name—or not even that.Odysseus tells Sinon, his sacrifice will be remembered by posterity,but what Sinon truly cares about, is whether he was treated as a human being, while he yet lived.This distinction is pivotal,since a question the film revisits often, is: just how much is glory worth?Agamemnon craved glory; Menelaus, glory; the suitors, the throne.The young Odysseus, too,believed deeds could define a man—but the dead can’t enjoy glory at all.This point holds true in the original The Odyssey, too.Once Odysseus entered the Underworld,
he’d see Achilles—the greatest hero of all Greece in life.yet after death, he made it clear, he’d rather live the most common,lowly life on earth, than be king in the realm of the dead.In Nolan’s film,Achilles isn’t tasked with this part;rather, that meaning is shifted to Sinon.I find this adaptation quite clever,since Achilles himself is so grand.If HE were to tell Odysseus that life trumps glory,it’d still amount to a chat between two legendary heroes.Swapping that for Sinon, a common soldier,makes that phrase’s weight, all the more profound.This man had no legends, no kingdom, nor any epics—he just wanted to live.Hence, when Odysseus later returned to Ithaca, and disguised himself under Sinon’s name,that act took on a whole new meaning.He finally brought the man he’d sacrificed back home—even as he slew Antinous,that very lot, which had sealed the draft’s fate years ago resurfaced.the film weaves an original character arc, from the Trojan War all the way to Ithaca’s final revenge—
most brilliantly done.and if Sinon stands for the duty Odysseus can’t shake off,Then, the character Zendaya plays, stands for those memories he can’t shake—likely the most pivotal adaptation in the entire film.From public casting interviews,Zendaya’s role was indeed Athena.Holland once recalled, Nolan asking him straight up if he’d mind, if he cast Zendaya as Athena.But what’s truly intriguing about the film, is that Nolan never tells the audience, just how Zendaya’s character exists within it.The film’s opening offers a vital clue:it’s “A Time of Apparent Magic”—an era where magic seems to exist.That word, “apparent,” is key,since Nolan blurs the line between myth and reality, right from the get go.Many miracles in the film lie in a rather ambiguous spot—you could, of course, believe that gods truly exist.or you could see these as explanations ancient humans gave, for natural phenomena and fate, they couldn’t grasp.Athena stands out even more so than other gods—
she’s pretty much the only humanoid deity, Odysseus sees time and again,yet each appearance feels deeply subjective.The film doesn’t use a beam of light or fancy SFX, for her to suddenly appear;often, it’s just the camera shifting slightly.In the prior shot, no one was by Odysseus’s side;then, once the frame re composed,Zendaya was already standing there.This treatment feels much like a thought, that suddenly enters the frame,leaving the audience forever unsure, if she is truly standing there before Odysseus,or just exists within his mind.Only when the memory of Troy’s fall surfaced in full, did this event gain another layer of meaning.Odysseus watched as Greek soldiers stormed the city, and the head of the Palladium was severed.Meanwhile, a common Trojan maiden died before him—and that maiden was portrayed by Zendaya.This lets us rethink all prior scenes where Athena showed up.One take hews close to traditional myth:that Athena WAS indeed aiding Odysseus.
she merely chose to appear with that dead girl’s face,using it to constantly remind Odysseus, of what truly transpired that night in Troy.Then there’s another take—which I feel aligns better with Nolan’s overall approach, in this film:that the Troyan girl, played by Zendaya,was just an ordinary person.What truly shifted was within Odysseus’s memory:from that night onward,he placed that girl’s face in the spot in his heart, where Athena once resided.For Athena stands for wisdom and war strategy,and the Trojan Horse was the very zenith of Odysseus’s wit.He won the war via this ploy,and it was on that very night, he saw firsthand what his own wisdom had reduced a city to.So, from then on,whenever Odysseus thought of Athena, of his own wit,and of those lauded war deeds,what sprang to his mind, would no longer be a perfect divine statue,but rather, that girl who died before the temple.The film doesn’t decide for the audience, which of these two explanations is the truth.
I think this handling is quite brilliant.For Odysseus himself,whether Athena truly appeared with that face,or if his guilt merely projected, that face onto the deity—ceases to matter.Each time Zendaya shows up,he confronts the very same question:what consequences his proudest asset—his wisdom—ultimately wrought.So, Nolan’s take on Odysseus’s ten year drift, can largely be seen as a lengthy bout of mental aftershocks, post war.And that explains why Calypso was made so pivotal.In the original, the Lotus Eaters and Calypso feature, in two distinct chapters:the lotus makes one forget their homeland,while Calypso kept Odysseus on her island for years.Nolan melded these two parts,having Calypso hand the lotus to Odysseus herself.It can ease both physical and mental anguish,while making memories grow ever more hazy.For someone who’d lost all his crew, and was on the verge of breaking down,this was pretty much the most comfortable way to live.yet the more Odysseus forgot,
the farther he strayed from Ithaca.He always kept the things Penelope had given him—those were his one, unbroken link to his past.So, when he at last asked Calypso to restore his memories,what he chose was, in fact, a voluntary sort of pain.To recall his wife meant recalling Troy, too;to remember his son meant confronting anew, those fallen soldiers.Calypso could let him live on in peace for seven years,ten, or even longer.but so long as this peace rested upon utterly, forgetting who he was,Odysseus could never truly return home.Viewing the Cyclops, Circe, Sirens, and Scylla anew, through this lens, reveals that Nolan never treated these monsters, as mere adventure stages.They’re more like rounds of character trials.Polyphemus the Cyclops is the most direct one.In Homer’s original,the most famous bit is the “Nobody” wordplay—where Odysseus tricks the giant, by claiming his name is “Nobody,”, then stabs out the giant’s eye with a spear.The giant’s screams drew its kin’s enquiries;
when they asked, “Who’s harming you?”, the giant replied: “Nobody.”, This bit, much like Ma Sanli’s classic crosstalk, “, Dou Ni Wan,” was cut entirely by Nolan,which markedly amped up the horror of the scene.The scene where Polyphemus devours the Greek soldiers, is filmed so brutally—humans before him, seem like ants, ready to be crushed at any moment.And this rather gory scene,in fact, relied heavily on very traditional, practical effects.Polyphemus the Cyclops wasn’t played by Christian Bale,who put on five tons of weight!but by Bill Irwin,who, having worked with Nolan before on “Interstellar,”, voiced the robot, TARS.When the giant shared the frame with live actors,the crew didn’t just rely on post production, to enlarge them;instead, they made heavy use of forced perspective, and layered filming.First, they shot Bill and the scaled down cave set separately.then they’d film Odysseus and his crew, acting out their part in another layer of Space,using camera placement,
set scale, and post production composites, to create that vast size disparity.For shots where Polyphemus is asleep, and actors must get close to his body,The crew also built a huge, physical, mechanical model, so that actors like Matt Damon could perform right beside it.The soldier nabbed by the Cyclops,whose head and arm get bitten off in one gulp—that, too, was practical filming.HAMMER FX, the firm handling the SFX,first scanned one of their own designers,then used that scan data to craft mini silicone soldiers, that could be genuinely “crunched”.The models also had three D printed bones, and blood pouches inside.So, when the giant actor bites down,it shows bones shattering and blood spurting out, from the model for real.So that close ups could hold up, when blown up on IMAX screens,the team even crafted full, shrunken suits, of armor and helmets, for these miniature soldiers.Even things like facial beards—which might go unnoticed in a regular shot—were crafted.And this tangible feel.
serves the theme of the Cyclops scene perfectly—Odysseus is no longer facing, some abstract mythic beast from a bard’s tales.He watched as his own soldiers were seized and torn, limb from limb—death unfolding just meters away from him.So, once the crew had escaped safely,Odysseus still chose to turn back and strike at Polyphemus—thus, the emotion behind this act, becomes far more understandable.He was safe,yet he couldn’t stomach the deaths he’d just witnessed.This blend includes pride, but more immediately,anger and vengeance—not the arrogance and gloating taunts from the original,which makes this whole scene feel more plausible.But either way, the end result is the same.Polyphemus pleaded to his father,the sea god Poseidon, against Odysseus—thus began his long, maritime ordeal.This aptly shows what the war left Odysseus with.His body had left Troy,yet his way of tackling problems remained on the battlefield.If someone killed his men, he had to repay that harm—
even if the situation was over, he had to make it right.The Cyclops—this trial truly laid Odysseus bare.even after the war, he couldn’t shake that mindset.After the Cyclops, Odysseus faced one ordeal after another.The first hurdle is Circe’s arc,which further spells out the film’s “civilization” theme—she turns Odysseus’s soldiers into pigs.The SFX here are quite sanity dropping,showing us Nolan’s sheer knack for body horror films.but what’s key is, upon regaining human form,that line: “Back into your disguises.”, In Circe’s eyes,pigs might be closer to these soldiers’ true selves.Human faces, armor, and their so called heroic status—these are all just veneers masking their desires.This crew waged war in Troy for ten years,and afterward, they kept landing on foreign shores,seizing food and resources,habitually putting their own needs first.The Greeks always believed they embodied civilization,yet to those whose homes they invaded,they were no different from beasts.
The Sirens, then, dealt with, Odysseus’s most unacknowledged desires.In the classic tale,the Sirens lured crewmen to their doom, with their lovely songs.The film keeps the bit, where Odysseus ties himself to the mast,yet re interprets the meaning of the singing.It makes you think of what you desire most,then reminds you that you’ve already lost it.For Odysseus, sure, he missed Ithaca, his wife, and his son—but what truly pained him was the man he was before the war.That Odysseus who left home still believing in glory,still believing he was a good man—had vanished, along with Troy.So, the Sirens episode reveals why Odysseus,while striving to get home,was also constantly delaying his return.What he truly feared was never just a storm.Once he sets foot on Ithaca,he must stand before Penelope and his son,letting them see the man he became post war—knowing home is still there.But the man who left home twenty years ago, can never be found again.This, too, is what stings most about the Sirens:
it made Odysseus realize, that some things he truly yearned for, could never be reclaimed,even if he did make it home in the end.Scylla and Charybdis, once more thrust the issue upon Odysseus—back to a commander’s most familiar realm:sacrifice—on one side,a whirlpool that could swallow the entire ship.the other, certain to snatch six crew members.Scylla.He chose to lose few to save the many.In hindsight, that was quite rational,yet he didn’t tell the crew of the full risks—an echo of Sinon all over again.The Trojan Horse could end the ten year war,so Sinon could be deceived;sailing near Scylla could save more lives.But those six crew members,completely unaware, became the price paid.Odysseus excelled at such calculations his whole life,and his problems began to surface right here.when one has long decided for others who merits survival, and who may be sacrificed for a greater good,those very choices will ultimately come back to haunt him.Hence, the Underworld.
became the most crucial stop of the entire journey.What Odysseus saw, there was no longer just prophecies of the future;he saw a tally of his past life thus far.Sinon stood before him anew,asking why he’d even deceived his own soldiers—those left unburied were there, waiting, too.Agamemnon, then, laid another possible outcome, right before Odysseus.For the sake of war,Agamemnon could sacrifice his daughter; for glory,he let his whole family bear the cost.In the end, he did win and returned to his own palace.but the war followed him home,and in the end, he died, at the hands of his wife and her lover.And that’s why the film devotes so much time to Penelope.Odysseus drifted abroad for twenty years;back in Ithaca,twenty years passed, too.Anne Hathaway’s take on Penelope isn’t portrayed as someone, who just stays put, waiting for her husband.Over a hundred suitors occupied the royal palace,eating Odysseus’s grain and drinking his wine.Each awaited Penelope to admit her husband was dead,
so they could claim Ithaca via marriage.She managed to hold out for so long via her wit:by day, she’d weave a burial shroud,and by night, she’d unravel it—so long as that shroud was never finished,she could keep stalling the suitors.So, what truly made Odysseus and Penelope a match, was always their shared grasp of language,time, and deception.One survived at sea via such means;the other stayed home and used them to guard the kingdom.When the two finally reunite,the film doesn’t portray it, as a simple hero’s triumphant return.For Penelope had lived independently for twenty years,and Odysseus, too, had become a different man.That line in the film about the empty throne is crucial—she’s shouldered the duties of a king for so long.Yet, society at large—simply because she’s a woman—still deems that throne “vacant.”, So, what’s so poignant about this reunion, is that two people, both changed by twenty years,must reaffirm if they still wish to carry on together.
Telemachus, meanwhile, grapples with how his generation, should view the wars of the last.This child had barely known his father at all.The Odysseus he heard of growing up, was one sung of by others—a great hero who devised the Trojan Horse to sack Troy.So, at the film’s start,a bard in Ithaca sings praises of Odysseus,yet Penelope tells him to hush up.This design, in fact,spells out the film’s key narrative method.The same Trojan War is a legend in the bard’s mouth,and a victory in Menelaus’s.yet when Odysseus himself retells that night,it morphs entirely into a horrid memory.One event is told many times;each shift in viewpoint alters its meaning.Travis Scott playing the bard serves this end, too.The Odyssey was first spread via bardic performances;they relied on rhythm, repetition,and set phrases, to pass down that epic of over ten thousand lines,generation after generation.Nolan casting a modern Rapper for this role, might seem jarring at first,but the logic behind it is spot on.
He aimed to echo the Ancient Greece bardic tradition, via today’s closest form of rhythmic, oral storytelling;many sound details in the film carry on this design.For instance, when Odysseus draws his bow,the sound of its string feeds right into the theme music.Later on, Penelope could even tell who stood before her, just by that sound.Here, the bow is both a weapon, and a person’s voice and identity.Here, when we circle back to the “Sea Peoples”, thread, The Odyssey’s portrayal of civilization and war, truly comes full circle.Throughout the film, folks mention marauders at sea,fretting that those strange, savage folk, are wrecking the world as it was.the collapse of the Bronze Age, had very complex causes in actual history,and the so called “Sea Peoples”, remain a topic of great academic debate.Nolan clearly had no intention, of solving this historical riddle, via one film;what he truly leveraged was the notion, that “we always thought the barbarians came from the outside.”.
The film’s final answer is quite subversive.Odysseus and his Greeks were those very “people from the sea”—they came ashore from the ocean onto foreign lands,seeking resources, plundering food, and launching attacks.then used the Trojan Horse to utterly destroy Troy.The Greeks had palaces, writing, trade, and art—so of course,they saw themselves as living in a civilized world;yet, what Circe saw was a herd of pigs cloaked in human skin.the Trojans saw were a mob of slaughterers, who came via sea to their very city.The line between civilization and savagery, was never the clear cut wall, Odysseus had once imagined.The suitors, though, brought that same issue back to Ithaca.They didn’t breach the city by sea,but exploited the protection Zeus’ law grants guests.they dwelled long within Odysseus’s palace,draining the family’s wealth, and even pressuring the lady of the house to remarry.They and the Trojan Horse form a neat mirror image.One side exploited the respect owed to guests, to enter Ithaca;
both sides twisted the rules of civilization, to satisfy their own desires.So, when Odysseus finally returned home disguised as a beggar,what this scene truly tested wasn’t his masking skills.He placed himself in society’s weakest spot.See what choices these folks make when faced with a stranger, who has no power, no status,and can’t even fight back.One might be quite polite before a king,but how they treat a beggar, is what truly reveals their true colors.This, too, is the true meaning of the phrase “, to view a person from below.”, Here, Zeus’ law, has shifted from an Ancient Greek religious custom, into a distinctly modern moral judgment.So, I feel “The Odyssey’s” anti war message is now quite whole.It doesn’t dwell on how brutal the battlefield was,or how many died—those most surface level things.It probes deeper:why does war cause a society that deems itself civilized, to swiftly forsake its own principles?Enemy lives are scorned,common soldiers’ lives are scorned,and Sinon is deceived.
The six folks before Scylla could be sacrificed;each act, viewed on its own, had its sound rationale.but once that mindset becomes habit,a civilization begins to slowly accept, that some folks can, by nature, be the price to pay.Odysseus did slay those suitors in the end,so Nolan didn’t grant him an ending, where he suddenly renounced violence altogether.The change he truly gained was the final grasp, that every act of violence,sacrifice, and deceit leaves irreversible consequences.Such things don’t just vanish once you’ve won.So, at the film’s end, Telemachus inherits Ithaca,while Odysseus and Penelope sail westward, to fulfill their promises to the dead.In the original, Tiresias did foretell, that Odysseus must keep on traveling.But Nolan extends this journey,linking it to those who couldn’t be laid to rest properly,imbuing Odysseus’s future life with a sense of atonement.So, at the end of “The Odyssey,”, the true “Homecoming” was fulfilled—it wasn’t just about returning to Ithaca;
that was just a geographical homecoming.What he finally achieved was a spiritual homecoming—one that required Odysseus himself to acknowledge.All that had transpired over the past twenty years, meant he could never again be the man he was, on the day he left Ithaca,nor could he bring the dead back to life.What he can do is acknowledge his own limits,accept that some things can’t be fixed,and then carry on with life bearing those things.So, that about covers the core and themes of “The Odyssey”;if you have anything else to add,feel free to discuss it nicely, in the danmu or comments section!Next, if we place this film back within, Nolan’s works from the past decade,a very clear thread emerges.This is what many now call Dunkirk, Oppenheimer,and The Odyssey—collectively dubbed Nolan’s War Trilogy.Of course, this isn’t the official series name given by Nolan,Warner Bros.,or Universal Pictures,but rather a grouping of these three films, based on their creative themes.
These three films were made in vastly different eras,and their characters and plots bear no connection,yet they each correspond to one of war’s three, most crucial stages:Dunkirk depicts how folks survive war;Oppenheimer shows how folks create the very power, to alter warfare itself.and “The Odyssey” is about how folks carry on living, after a war,burdened by what it left behind.twenty seventeen’s “Dunkirk” is the first part of this trilogy.In this film,Nolan strips away nearly all the grand narratives, typical of war pics.Without knowing the backstory,viewers have no clue why the war reached this point,nor do they see Winston Churchill sitting before a map,explaining strategy.Most of the film follows those regular soldiers, trying to leave that beach;their core goal is starkly simple: to make it home alive.Whether a British soldier could become a hero, no longer mattered;what counted most was if he could board that ship, and set foot on Great Britain’s soil again.
So, “Dunkirk” portrays the people within the war,letting viewers step right onto, the war machine’s most immediate front.see just how tiny individuals in war, are amidst planes, bombs, the sea, and the pressure of time.That sense of triumph at coming home in the film’s finale, is also portrayed with restraint,since the Dunkirk evacuation itself, was no traditional military victory.What Nolan truly celebrates is people managing to survive,and the ordinary folk who sailed their small boats, to bring those young soldiers home.Here, war foremost means that life could vanish at any moment.Six years later, “Oppenheimer” shifts its focus, from those on the battlefield, to those who crafted the tools of war.Nolan didn’t film the atomic bomb, striking Hiroshima or Nagasaki at all;instead, he spent three hours, filming a group of the world’s smartest people.How does one turn a theory into reality?Oppenheimer, of course, knew why he was doing this—and he had ample historical reasons, too.
But once the atomic bomb succeeded,and humanity gained, for the first time,a destructive force that could alter its own destiny,he realized that success was not the end at all.So, “Oppenheimer” is about creation amidst war.Human wisdom can help a nation win a war,and also create things that, from then on,no one can ever take back.That arena scene becomes the film’s most pivotal part, because everyone outside is celebrating victory.But Oppenheimer saw the price of this victory—and therein lies the war machine’s most fearsome aspect.It can pool together highly brilliant minds,cutting edge science, and the most pressing real world needs.ultimately yielding an outcome, that even its own creator began to fear.For “The Odyssey,” Nolan moves the timeline forward yet again.The Trojan War was won;the Trojan Horse had succeeded;Odysseus had earned glory enough, for bards to sing of for millennia.yet the film’s tale has only just begun;he must spend ten years facing those who died.
due to his own choices.facing the slaughter his own cleverest ploy wrought,and then having to relearn, how to return to his wife and children.So, “The Odyssey” portrays people post war;it ponders what forms war might take, even after victory has been won.Taken together, these three films, form Nolan’s ever more complete, take on war.“ Dunkirk” asks if people can survive war; “, Oppenheimer” asks just how perilous a level, humanity can push war to.And The Odyssey then asks: once war finally ends,can those people and civilizations changed by, it ever truly return to normal?one depicts how the body flees the battlefield;one shows how wisdom forges forces of destruction;and one portrays how the soul departs from war.They share no continuous plot, yet boast a clear, core lineage.And these three films share one more thing:Nolan never bases his anti war message, on the simple notion that war is bad.In “Dunkirk,” the British soldiers had to retreat,since the whole nation—and all of Europe—
had to carry on fighting.Oppenheimer never denied the righteousness, of the Manhattan Project,given the wartime context back then.Developing the atomic bomb before the Nazi did, meant deciding the very survival of all humankind.Nor does “The Odyssey” claim, that Odysseus should have just stood outside Troy back then, and done nothing.What Nolan repeatedly asks, is: once a person in war has a sound, justifiable goal,How far will he let himself go,and who, in the end, must bear the brunt of those choices?“ Dunkirk’s” answer is the simplest: war, first demands human lives.Oppenheimer expands that cost to all of human civilization—since science, at last, gave war, the power to destroy the world.“ The Odyssey” then brings the question back, to each individual person:a war hero may make it home,yet can never return to the person he was before the war.Thus, these three films—spanning the body, civilization, and the spirit—form a cohesive body of war themed work.
So, if we must find a common theme for Nolan’s “War Trilogy”,I think it can be summed up in one simple phrase:war’s true cost never ends when the war does.The young soldiers on the beaches of Dunkirk, made it back alive,yet they still had to confront the war.Oppenheimer finished the atomic bomb;the nuclear age had only just begun.Odysseus at last returned to Ithaca,where he’d spend the rest of his life, grappling with what he’d done.Nolan has made three films of entirely different genres—from sea, land, and air retreats, to nuclear physics,and then from World War two back to Ancient Greece, three millennia ago.Ultimately, they all hinge on one same question:what astounding things can people create in war,and how long must they bear the costs thereof?And that’s why I feel “, The Odyssey” fits so well after “Oppenheimer.”, Oppenheimer ends with the creator, realizing he might have sparked a chain reaction, that could destroy the world.The Odyssey then probes further:
how does one who has wrought destruction, carry on living with that knowledge?One man grows fearful at the very moment of his success;another, ten years on,still can’t shake free of that night’s flames.They all boil down to one question:human wisdom can now achieve SO much.But can our sense of moral responsibility, and our capacity to bear consequences, truly keep pace with our own wisdom?
--- 由 vCaptions 生成 ---