The Odyssey (2026): Review

Christopher Nolan turns Homer’s epic into Odysseus’s fragmented memoir, while Hoyte van Hoytema and Ludwig Göransson make the journey feel larger than mythology itself.

A lone vessel approaches the impossible as the sea folds into a vast whirlpool — an AI-generated editorial illustration inspired by the mythic scale and oceanic dread of The Odyssey.

Overall Rating: ★★★★½–4.5/5

There are some films where my opinion becomes clearer immediately after leaving the theatre, and then there are films that become more complicated the longer I think about them. Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey belongs firmly to the second category for me. I understand some of the criticism surrounding it. There are scenes I would personally remove, tonal decisions I still find strange, and certain interpretations of Homer that I do not completely agree with. But the more I think about what Nolan, Hoyte van Hoytema and Ludwig Göransson accomplish together, the harder it becomes for me to dismiss the film because of those imperfections.

That is why I finally land at 4.5 out of 5.

I would not call The Odyssey a perfect film, and I still would not call it Nolan’s greatest film. But there are moments here where the scale, cinematography, sound, editing and music stop feeling like separate technical departments and become one enormous cinematic experience. When this film works, I do not simply admire what Nolan has made. I…