The Desolation of Nolan II

Ah, the Odyssey, the film version of which is summed as Men are bad, Men hurt others, Women are good, Women are victims. Which describes most of the movies coming out of Hollywood these days. So unoriginal and toxic to the culture.

Ah, the Odyssey, a file which claims to be an adaption, so much so that it claims the title of the epic poe  m, yet tramples on the story’s themes, characters, plots and moral virtues. Some of it comes from modern disrespect of what came before. There has been an element in human mentality of “civilized” folk thinking themselves superior to the barbarians (a judgment that goes back to the first Sumerian cities, if not before), and that perspective, as with so many things, holds both truth and lie (that would be its own blog). In our current-view context, much of what came before and the peoples that lived in such times are judged as barbarians (not as “enlightened”). We have evolved. We are better. We know enlightened things. And so it’s easy to disregard the stories of old—the stories from those we were not as “good” as we are now.

Modern “edified” mindsets have become so myopic as to preclude the idea that anyone else has anything interesting to say, especially from those that came before, even as we pillage their stories. The hypocrisy reeks of ego and entitlement. Which leads to the other impulse of wanting to recreate the past into the modern image.

Which isn’t to say there are not many modern stories that need to be told. But the pillaging of franchises and older stories comes from a second dynamic—the decline of creativity. The Odyssey still invokes fascination, it is a foundational story to western literature, and Nolan uses that to tell his Vietnam, PTSD war-trauma story with feminist overlays as his own version of a Trojan Horse.

Though my blog last week was long, there are still too many places left untouched.

I’ll start with Circe then go straight to Hell (where this travesty belongs).

I touched on Circe last week (but I wanted to get into the scene details)—a goddess reduced to a being a witch. Yet oddly enough, a “real” witch with powers as if that’s any less remarkable than a goddess. I suppose given that change is to Nolan’s credit that she looks like a witch instead of a goddess, but I have a feeling that’s driven by the WOKE proclivity to equate beauty with oppression. One of the many foundational issues with the film version is that Nolan at once doesn’t appreciate or even like the story yet he wants the pretense of doing an adaption. In the poem, Odysseus is forewarned by Hermes of Circe’s nature—he’s not going in blind which allows Odysseus to get the best of her (but we can’t have a man do that!). There is some back and forth between Circe and Odysseus where there is an effort to generate tension. And to a point, that works. But when Circe lunges at Odysseus with a knife, he grabs a crow in a cage who happens to be Circe’s sister whom she loves. And Odysseus somehow guesses that. Well, that’s EXTREMELY convenient because I would assume that anyone she turned into an animal was on her bad list. So Circe “loves” her sister but turned her into a crow and keeps her in a cage? Sounds sick, evil and plot-contrived convenient to me. This is pure Nolan mangling the poem—what he does makes no sense because, well, he’s inserting himself into the story and he’s not a storyteller on par with Homer.

As an aside, MANY times I have made edits to the plot but I can’t recall any situation where I didn’t have to then run the impacts of that change(s) through the story (always after the point of change and often before). So Nolan’s frequent alternations require a lot of thought (which wasn’t done) to make them work (and that’s assuming the changes were thoughtful to begin with).

Then we get into Circe’s anti-men tirade (which is a Hollywood check box) where Nolan also attempts to reassert his grounded realism (so boring for fantasy) of Circe’s capacity for witchery. Circe says, in the film, “I did not turn your men into anything. Look at them. This is who they are. Look at them.  Disgusting, primal urges that you value in battle. You sent them to me here on my own. A gang of filthy soldiers with empty bellies and hot blood. You thought they would respect me? In my home?” A Nolan inserted feminist rampage from a woman who from what we can tell in the movie as not been abused or even a witness to abuse given her remote location. She is taking on the mantle of victim-hood for people she has never met. Very elitist. Very modern. Odysseus asks, “Did they hurt you?” and Circe answers, “They would’ve.” Meaning, she had no justification to turn them into pigs (and here it’s implied the men turned themselves into pigs because that’s what men are). That coming from someone who turned her favorite sister into a crow. Toxic feminism on full display. This is all a Nolan insertion, and since its clumsy, and his idea, he doesn’t know what to do with it so Circe just agrees to change them back without much convincing (she says at the pigs, “back into your disguises” meaning she has not changed her opinion that the soldiers are indeed pigs).

In the poem, Odysseus wins Circe over in part by besting her, then becoming her lover but we can’t show Odysseus as cunning or desiring a beautiful woman. It would make too much sense! In Nolan’s film, the crew should have killed her if only to prevent her from victimizing more people that happen to her island.  

It’s here where we get a transition to Hell. As noted, in the poem, Odysseus gains Circe’s help by becoming her lover. But in Nolan’s version, again because he has perverted the characters into something other than found in the Odyssey, he clumsily moves the plot forward by having Circe simply agree to help. For reasons. Which, in this case, means going to Hell for guidance. It is one of the most important sections of the poem.

I find it interesting that Nolan submitted to having a Hell given that implies the Gods exist, and I feel quite sure that clever Nolan understood his dilemma but he didn’t have a choice if he wanted to claim the pretense of an adaption. Nolan abandons his grounded realism by portraying Hell, he must have hated having to include it, and it shows.

Here, Odysseus witnesses some of the punishments which have reverberated through culture for thousands of years. The most important interaction in the poem is between Odysseus and Achilles. Here, a moral virtue is explored. Odysseus tells Achilles that the Greeks praise Achilles, sings songs and worship him for his heroic deeds. But Achilles says he would rather be alive as the lowest servant working for the lowest farmer than be king of the dead. Achilles is somber and finds no comfort in the praises of the living, but when Odysseus tells Achilles that his son achieved honor and spoils in the battle of Troy, Achilles is comforted and walks proudly away. He cannot have his life back, but he lives on through his son. In death, his son matters to him more than all the glory he achieved. The poem is profound, a commentary on the pursuit of gold and glory, and that it will amount to nothing in the end.

It’s a profound, thought-provoking theme. It’s an anti-war theme! But it’s not a Vietnam-trauma in need of drugs and therapy story. Homer told a story about a man who still had things to learn in life and obstacles to overcome. Nolan’s was about a broken semblance of a man in need of a couch.

Part of Homer’s moral virtue showed here is that in our children, we live on. It’s the kind of theme that feels quite urgent to explore given how so many young couples have opted to remain childless—children take time, they are expensive, and they reduce agency and power for women (or so is the feminist thought). How cool would it be touch on the emptiness of this choice? To get people to think about who they are and why—but no, Nolan cannot stomach the idea of doing anything meaningful especially in regard to the impulse to have children, the implications of such choices, the sanctity of family...which means Achilles was out.

It’s one of the many reasons why his film cannot be properly called an adaption.

In the place of Achilles was put Sinon. More on that in a moment. In the place of Odysseus’ mother, (who also had a narrative purpose of imparting to her son what it is to be a man) was Agamemnon (Darth Vader in the Nolan version) where we are told he was murdered by his wife upon his return. In Nolan’s version, Agamemnon sacrificed his daughter in his relentless drive for glory and war; he is corrupt, and empty. But in the Odyssey, this never happens. In later works, such as the Oresteia, where this element was added, the goddess Artemis compels Agamemnon into making the sacrifice or she will refuse him and his men ever getting home (this as a punishment for the killing of one of Artemis’ stags during a hunt).

So Agamemnon in the film is portrayed pretty much as a dick. He killed his daughter for reasons, which justifies his wife, Clytemnestra, killing him out of vengeance (one can argue whether Agamemnon made the right choice, whether he was a villain for doing so, but there is nuance and complexity). I think here Nolan is kneeling at the men are just pigs altar again by not allowing Agamemnon to have any humanity. Otherwise, Clytemnestra’s killing him takes on a much darker tone, and Nolan can’t have that (WOMEN!).

In the poem, Agamemnon does not sacrifice his daughter, and he was murdered as a power play upon his throne by his wife (Clytemnestra, sister to Helen) and her lover. Meaning, Clytemnestra and her lover are villains in the poem. Modern films have a thing about women not being a bad or if they are there must be justification to make the badness sympathetic. Sigh. Because of this self-imposed framework, we get a much less interesting Agamemnon in the film than existed in the poem or in the Oresteia. The film version of Agamemnon is not so much a character but a representation of the dead lives lived by men.

From the movie, my judgment is that Nolan hates or at least despises himself.

Sinon was put in place of Achilles. As noted last week, Sinon appeared in the Aeneid, a thousand years after Homer’s poem (which is a testament to the influence of the story—people were adapting it thousands of years ago—making changes but overall staying faithful to the tale). Pretty cool.

Sinon was known as a clever spy. But you don’t get that from Nolan’s film. It’s simply not possible for Sinon to not be aware of what the Trojan Horse was designed for (which, just an FYI, the Greeks would have been idiots to make it hard for the Trojans to take it into the city given that the 10 year siege had just been lifted). First, Sinon’s a SPY. Second, he would have to be retarded to not be curious and to not figure it out (he was on beach as it was being built and the Greeks climbed into it!). In the Aeneid, Sinon was fully aware of the plan because of course he was. Nolan went for contrivance and he did so for a plot device used SO MANY TIMES—the ally/friend duped about the real plan in order to be convincing to the bad guys—which is an ok device if earned but in this case it’s not reasonable or even possible for Sinon to not know what is going on. And the dialogue—from a character not in the poem, not fleshed out, whining away, essentially being used as a device to say that Odysseus should be ashamed of himself (there’s a lot of that in Nolan’s Odyssey so much so I can’t help but think it’s projection).  

Also, since Nolan uses Elliot Page as Sinon, and EP is small, would that not be the first person you would put in the Trojan Horse? Would that at least not give some justification for using EP as the actor? It’s not like Nolan cares much for what the source texts say. Wasn’t anyone paying attention? Sinon’s dialogue is wooden, the acting is unconvincing but on par with most of the others in the movie.

Another dynamic is that in the poem, Homer goes to Hell alone. In Nolan’s version, the full crew goes. In terms of an adaption, that’s a choice that can be made but there must be more substance to it than getting a shot of Odysseus and his men fleeing from Hell (in the trailer, it was conveyed to imply a battle, but instead the “hero” is running away from his conscience and his shame!). A deeper problem is that none of the crew are characters—they are merely fodder to kill off in action set pieces. They don’t seem to care much for each other (even after fighting side by side in a 10-year siege); I wonder if Nolan has any male friends who are, well, men. The crew blithely talked about the Cyclops eating a couple of their mates right after it happened; who are these men to care so little for each other given their shared ordeal?

I like the idea of Odysseus marching into Hell alone. But Nolan involved the crew, and he did so without reason and thereby created yet another mangled plot beat that he solved through more contrivance. In the poem, Hell has a blind prophet, Tiresias, who gives Odysseus a prophecy. In the poem, he’s there alone. His men mostly believe Odysseus but then later violate the prophetic warning. In Nolan’s version, he’s not alone but the crew can’t hear the prophecy so the men are simply sent back to the ship. It’s forced. The prophecy conveys that one path (deadly whirlpool-Charybdis) for Odysseus will kill them all and other will be the loss of 6 (6 headed Scylla monster). Given that, there is far more drama if the crew knows—who will be the 6? How will that be determined? Or you could have the crew challenge the prophecy given the otherwise dire choices and try for a path where all survive. Drama.

 And then Tiresias ends with yet more wooden dialogue: “Why do you value these men’s lives more than those you’ve already lost.”  Nolan’s Odysseus replies, “I can still save these men’s lives.” From which the prophet says, “But not from themselves.”

Why would Odysseus not value men still living more than the dead? The line, “but not from themselves” is modern therapy-speak which hasn’t been earned in the context of the film because we know practically nothing about the crew. And Nolan can’t be bothered to show us and let us the movie goers figure it out.

I’m done for today. This film is like an overused dog park. There’s no safe place to step. Likely more next week.

Truly, this is a desolation.