The Liberal Agenda – ODYSSEY 3.5 stars review
So I saw it on Imax because if you are even going to consider leaving the house these days, it’s for an ‘experience’.
At my age, my cynicism is so terminal that effort demands uniqueness of experience.
So off to the insect infested IMAX cinema it is.
Jesus wept it’s horrific.
Not the movie.
The IMAX Theatre.
You know how coral reefs look when they die off?
This is worse.
All of the retail shops are dead. There’s a decrepit arcade and cheap mini golf that is gasp inducingly expensive, but other than IMAX and the cinemas, this once majestic jewel in the crown of futuristic 1990s Auckland, (built upon the bones of Planet Hollywood Franchise No. 365), is as wrecked as Queen Street still locked down by City Rail Link construction.
IMAX is only slightly less depressing than the bleak freezing homeless sleeping outside.
This Odyssey review is becoming an Odyssey.
Ok.
It’s a good movie. Go see it at IMAX or any other similar big screen experience.
I like Nolan.
I like the unvarnished humanism of his work.
He’s a great story teller and that is what is happening here.
The first SuperHero Film of them all.
Part 2 in the Series and some say the best.
The Odyssey is Empire Strikes Back with less lightsabers.
It has all the classic moments we know and love from Homer. The Cyclops, The Sirens, Circe, pissed off Poseidon, furious Apollo, Lotus Island Blues and then the greatest violence for single scene ending that was ever created.
It’s Kill Bill 1 and 2 death count squeezed into 20 minutes at the end
It has it all.
But it’s just good.
It’s not incredible or amazing or earth shattering.
It’s just bloody good telling of one of the first stories from an expert story teller.
Homer is Shakespeare before Shakespeare.
Nolan’s devotion to realism does have some set backs.
His refusal to use any CGI is adorbes but for quarter of a Billion I’m looking for a Cyclops I can believe, not the weird puppet thing they ended up using.
The only special effect worse than the Cyclops was the youth version of Elliot Page. Come. On. Suspending belief doesn’t reach that far.
I’m going to politely ignore Scylla and Charybdis.
Odysseus pays the price for breaking the rules of the Gods when he butchers the City of Troy and sparks the greatest PTSD Journey of all time.
War. What is it good for?
A very long road home.
Odysseus represents human intellect and even though us smart monkeys can come up with clever ways to murder one another, if the guardrails the Gods build into place get breached by a clever clogs, you goin’ git some.
Don’t be a smart arse is basically the message here.
I think it’s a good film but it is an IMPORTANT movie.
ANYTHING that can make Americans appreciate they didn’t invent narrative, ethics or democracy, is a really good thing right now.
If it makes one Trucker with a Red Cap a little more reflective, that’s a win.
3 and a half stars
