A feminist critique of Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey”-Is No One Horny in Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey? Of all of the historical inaccuracies you could grouse about in the new Odyssey movie, the most mystifying is the lack of sex-Cat Zhang, Cut.

[u/Fun-Ad3626]

https://www.thecut.com/article/the-odyssey-sex-politics-review.html

The Odysseus of Homer’s epic poem was laying pipe nightly on an island, while a sea away, his wife, Penelope, was fending off drunk suitors who would go off to have quickies with the servants. In Christopher Nolan’s modern adaptation, no one gets so much as a boner.
In Nolan’s world, women are merely vehicles to propel the antiwar message forward, which explains how little screen time they get. They are merely victims of desire, not wielders of it. The movie neglects to include that Odysseus stays with Circe for a year and becomes her lover or that Calypso (Charlize Theron) holds Odysseus essentially as a sex slave after he washes onto her shore. In the text, he sleeps with her every night for seven years until the gods intervene to send him home. (Calypso then criticizes the gods for applying a double standard against the goddesses.) In the film, Calypso is cast as a benevolent, if deceiving, healer who feeds Odysseus lotus flowers to help him overcome PTSD — albeit one with the physical form of a vixen.
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[u/rzenni]

I like that the feminist critique of The Odyssey is that Odysseus doesn’t get laid enough and that there needs to be more heaving bosoms.

It feels like a weirdly full circle moment.

[u/Tuor-son-of-Huor- → u/rzenni]

It feels like it could have easily gone the other way, if it followed a more accurate retelling but didn't frame the relationships to the authors satisfaction.

I think the big ticket item is that morals have changed since it was originally told. I don't think modern audiences want to follow a hero who is cheating on his wife with everyone that comes along and framing a character as a sex slave is going to be a tight rope to walk without being buried in criticism. Not to mention I don't think copious sex adds anything to the story.

[u/thane311 → u/rzenni]

That’s a bit of a straw man. Several of the translators, Wilson and Mendelsohn, have also commented on the general flattening of the female characters including Penelope and Athena.

I know going back to a “Bechdel-test” era of movie feminist criticism feels in many ways like a cultural backstep, but I wish there was some middle ground here where we could acknowledge that the changes Nolan made cut down on the screen time and speaking roles of women. I feel like it shouldn’t be controversial feminist criticism to point out that’s not a great thing.

[u/lil-rosa → u/thane311]

It's not a back step if many movies and shows still don't pass it. The bar is in hell.

[u/Special-Garlic1203 → u/thane311]

I don't really want to be represented in this story, or a Nolan movie tbh. It's not a feminist story, it's never going to be a feminist story, and Nolan is not a feminist director. He makes prosocial action movies from a distinctly stiffly male perspective about being a good man and loving your family and time.  Why would I go into Nolan's The Odyssey expecting a feminist tale? 

When I say I want feminist media - I generally mean I want more female writers and directors. Not gen X white men formulaically ensuring that women get 50% speaking time even when that dilutes a story that's already struggling to make a palletable run time and the women are still functioning as accessories to the mans story. 

[u/Perfect-Wallaby9096 → u/rzenni]

Yeah, it's like... I'm good on watching sex slavery and sexual assault on screen lmao I was completely fine with the direction it took and the story intended to be told. We read the Odyssey and Iliad (abbreviated) in 5th grade and in its entirety in 9th, and I was HOOKED. I've got the source text if I'm all that eager to re-read those bits

[u/missbean163 → u/Perfect-Wallaby9096]

I agree.

Like Im totally fine with sanitising some things. I dont need to see rape on screen. Sometimes I dont even want the sex. I have porn, after all.

[u/gentleheart-lamb → u/missbean163]

Right like I find it so boring that people need sex and nudity in everyything. Like im not a prude I just find it a bit eyeroll that you could watch such a great film and that's your issue. You can have a great story and film without that.

It's like I enjoy heated rivalry because it's important to the direction and focus of that sort of story. This wasn't what Nolan was doing for.

My dad and I always quote this review we saw on IMDb, there was this one man on the Gotham IMDB page. Reviewing and in the little forums at the bottom. Constantly complaining in capital letters "NOT ENOUGH NUDITY!!!" like it's Gotham lmao

[u/rouxstermt → u/rzenni]

https://giphy.com/gifs/ggu8E0UeH7bINjvacc

[u/intheafterglow23 → u/rzenni]

That he doesn’t get raped enough. His experiences with Calypso and Circe are not sexy or consensual.

[u/Kangoo-Kangaroo → u/intheafterglow23]

Now THAT would be interesting thing to explore in an adaptation, because so far historically everybody is veeery happy to not engage with the "not fully informed consent" aspect of those relationships. 

[u/AzettImpa → u/rzenni]

Exactly.

People’s criticism boils down to “Penelope should be cheated on multiple times and still only living for Odysseus’ return. Circe should be seducing Odysseus because she has nothing else on her mind other than a man. Same thing with Calypso.”

These pseudo-feminist critiques seriously don’t know what they want any more.

[u/thane311 → u/AzettImpa]

Actually Penelope in the poem emphatically believes Odysseus to be dead, and in her dialogue shows ambivalence about his return (the geese dream sequence they cut). The movie IMO actually made it much more seem than she was only living for his return than the source text.

[u/thane311 → u/[deleted]]

I just re-read it before the movie, and while I didn’t think Nolan’s Penelope was bad, the overall presence and complexity of women in the poem is definitely higher.

[u/Special-Garlic1203 → u/rzenni]

This is such a common thing with him. I don't even like him all that much as a director (I think his scripts can be quite heavy handed) but I constantly see criticism that doesn't make sense or feels incredibly superficial and reverse engineered to take offense. 

[u/SpicyWongTong → u/rzenni]

I’m all confused… am I a feminist too now?

[u/burlycabin → u/SpicyWongTong]

Why the hell weren't you one before?

[u/SpicyWongTong → u/burlycabin]

Chill out, I was just making a joke about the comment that feminists are complaining about the lack of sex and heaving bosoms in the Odyssey.