I have seen some blowback from Homer purists over Christopher Nolan’s interpretation of The Odyssey. Their criticism is not entirely baseless. This is not a page-for-page adaptation of Homer’s epic. Characters are reinterpreted, events are compressed, and a considerable amount of context is left somewhere on the cutting-room floor.

But fidelity has never been my only standard for an adaptation.

I hated the Brad Pitt version of Troy, but not simply because it changed The Iliad. I hated it because most of its changes made the story less interesting. The same principle applies to Hoosiers. The true story was already remarkable, yet the movie added an abusive coach, an alcoholic assistant and a star player who refuses to play for half the season. Those additions did not improve the story. They replaced authentic drama with familiar Hollywood machinery.

An adaptation can change the source material. It just has to justify the changes.

By the end of The Odyssey, I felt Nolan had.

This version presents Odysseus not merely as a clever adventurer attempting to return home, but as a man haunted by tragedy and by his growing understanding of what produces tragedy. He has witnessed the worst of humanity, including the greed, lust, anger and rage that helped drag an entire civilization into war. Worse, he has been forced to recognize some of those same impulses within himself.

I am hesitant to use the modern clinical language of PTSD too heavily when discussing a mythical hero, but the film clearly portrays a man carrying the psychological weight of war. His regret and accumulated trauma help explain some of his shoddy decision-making, his anger and even his defiance of the gods. He does not always act like the brilliant strategist we expect Odysseus to be. At first, I thought the movie had simply made him look like an idiot. As the story continued, however, I began to see those decisions differently.

This is not a foolish man who occasionally becomes clever when the plot requires it. This is a clever man whose judgment has been damaged by everything he has seen, done and survived.

We also get a glimpse of that burden through Helen. When she apologizes to Telemachus for her role in the war, the film briefly widens its perspective. Troy was not simply a grand battlefield where legendary men performed legendary deeds. It was a human catastrophe created by human appetites, leaving nearly everyone involved to carry some measure of guilt.

Matt Damon wears that weight particularly well during the conversation between Odysseus and Penelope. That scene provides the thematic thread that ties the entire movie together. Without it, the film could have felt like a collection of famous episodes: here is the Cyclops, here is Circe, here are the giants, here is another monster waiting behind the next rocky coastline.

That is largely how The Odyssey felt when I read it in high school: a series of adventures connected by one man’s desire to get home.

The movie reframes those adventures as pieces of a larger meditation on war, regret and human nature. Odysseus is not only traveling toward Ithaca. He is slowly understanding what Troy did to him and what human beings repeatedly do to one another.

The treatment of Calypso was one of the movie’s more successful reinterpretations. In many versions, she comes across as plainly selfish and manipulative, holding Odysseus because she wants him and refusing to accept his desire to leave. This Calypso appears to believe she is helping him. She offers peace, safety and escape from mortality, and she seems genuinely unable to understand why he would reject it.

That does not make his captivity acceptable, but it makes her more tragic and more human. She sees herself as Odysseus’ salvation. He still experiences her paradise as a prison.

Circe, unfortunately, was done much dirtier. I understand that cuts have to be made, especially when adapting an epic that has accumulated thousands of years of interpretation, but too much of her context disappeared. Circe is far more than the woman who turns men into pigs. Her relationship with Odysseus changes, she becomes an ally, and her guidance plays an important role in the journey ahead. Here, much of that complexity is reduced to a brief stop along the road.

I was also disappointed that we did not receive even a short version of Odysseus’ conversation with Achilles in Hades. Their exchange is one of the most important moments in Homer’s poem, undercutting the glory traditionally associated with heroic death. In a movie already interested in the cost of war and the burden carried by its survivors, that conversation would have fit naturally.

The film speaks often of gods and fate, but Athena, played by Zendaya, is the only god who actually appears. That choice keeps the story grounded more firmly in human decisions while still preserving the feeling that unseen powers are shaping events. It is another major departure from Homer, but one that works within the interpretation Nolan has chosen.

Robert Pattinson is sufficiently dislikable as the chief suitor, echoing Joaquin Phoenix’s Commodus in Gladiator, although not quite reaching that wonderfully repellent standard. His purpose is clear: we are supposed to want this man dead. Mission accomplished. When his end arrived, I was happy to see it.

Himesh Patel was also excellent as Eurylochus. He brings enough intelligence and humanity to the role that his disagreements with Odysseus feel like more than insubordination inserted to create tension. I hope Patel continues getting substantial roles. He has a presence that makes supporting characters feel as though they have lives beyond the edges of the frame.

John Leguizamo was also in the film, although at some point during the last several years he appears to have quietly transformed into Joe Pantoliano. I am not sure when that happened, but I am now accepting it as part of the natural aging process.

Then there is Argos. Damn it, Argos. That scene produced an audible “ah, shit” from me. Of all the monsters, battles and gruesome deaths in this story, it was the old dog that landed the cleanest emotional blow. Some ancient weapons remain effective.

The violence itself is frequently brutal. Several deaths arrive with gruesome, unusually loud sound effects. The impact is clearly intentional. Nolan does not allow mythological violence to become clean or weightless. Bodies break. Weapons make sickening contact. The audience is reminded that an epic killing is still a killing.

I would not be surprised to see the sound editing receive awards attention. The film’s soundscape is frequently overwhelming, sometimes unpleasantly so, but that discomfort serves the story.

At nearly three hours, the movie also strengthens my belief that films of this length should bring back intermissions. A man my age now requires a hydration strategy before purchasing a ticket. At some point, artistic immersion begins competing directly with bladder capacity.

The ending is where the film’s interpretation finally locked into place for me. The observation that dawn will break again and humanity will forget its mistakes immediately reminded me of the ending of The Wire.

Part of that connection comes from the final montage, which shows the same institutions and patterns continuing with different people occupying familiar roles. It also reminded me of Omar’s death barely making the newspaper. A character who had become mythic to the audience is reduced to a tiny blurb while the world continues turning.

The Odyssey creates a similar change in scale. We have spent hours following legendary figures through an epic war and a nearly impossible voyage. Then dawn arrives again.

The adventure that consumed Odysseus’ life becomes another story. Humanity continues, forgets and repeats itself. The individuals change, but greed, lust, anger and rage remain ready to begin the cycle again.

That ending puts the entire epic into perspective. It does not argue that Odysseus’ journey was meaningless. It reminds us that even the greatest human stories eventually become memories, myths and footnotes beneath another sunrise.

No, Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is not pure Homer. Some characters lose important context, some episodes are compressed, and some of the changes will understandably frustrate viewers who wanted a more traditional adaptation.

But this was never presented as a museum exhibit. It is a new interpretation. By the end, the changes revealed something meaningful about Odysseus: not just the clever hero who survived monsters and angered gods, but a man trying to return home after learning what human beings are capable of doing to one another. And what he himself was capable of doing.

The film changes Homer, but unlike Troy, it does not leave the original story smaller. It uses those changes to find a coherent thematic purpose beneath the adventures. That was enough to earn them.

Rating: 9 out of 10 stars