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Director Christopher Nolan defends against multiple controversies behind The Odyssey, including the modern-day English and historical inaccuracies.
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Fariba Rezwan
Published Jul 10, 2026, 6:58 PM EDT
Fariba Rezwan is a Lead Editor for the Movie News team. She has been with ScreenRant for nearly five years, with roles ranging from list editor to junior news editor. During that time, Fariba has led coverage for breaking movies and TV news, including Hunger Games, Marvel, and streaming. Additionally, she has actively provided commentary and reactions to the biggest movies and shows on her YouTube channel, The Movieception Show. Sign in to your ScreenRant account
Christopher Nolan won't go without a fight to defend his upcoming fantasy epic The Odyssey.
The director's upcoming adaptation of Homer's epic poem is easily one of the highly anticipated movies of 2026. However, when the first The Odyssey trailers dropped, many viewers were stunned that most characters spoke with American accents and the dialogue was modern English. In contrast, Homer's poem originated in Ancient Greece. As a result, Nolan's vision and creative liberties fueled backlash for lacking Greek representation and authenticity and even being accused of cultural appropriation.
While speaking with the Los Angeles Times, Nolan referred to a "language that has emotional not intellectual meaning to people," and chose contemporary English dialogue rather than elevated speech that would make the script artificial. The Oscar-winning filmmaker continued, saying, "I was maybe being naïve, it might bite me on the ass, but I wanted an earthy narrative. To me it was a no-brainer.”
Unfortunately, the controversy behind The Odyssey doesn't end there. The fantasy adaptation has a growing list of grievances, including historical inaccuracies and the casting of Lupita N'yong'o's Helen of Troy. However, Nolan isn't intimidated by the backlash, saying to The Telegraph: "Comes with the territory... But look, these conversations that happen before people see the film – they’re always irrelevant, because no one having them knows what the film actually is yet."
After detailing a similar experience with The Dark Knight trilogy, he acknowledged, "In the end, fans of the property – even when we were doing something that was not what they would have done – enjoyed the sincerity of the attempt to put as good a version of it on screen as we could." Even then, he hopes that the reaction would be the same, saying, "All I can do is make the best film I possibly can in the most sincere way. It’s very different from how anyone else would do it, but that’s what adaptation is."
Despite the backlash, it hasn't impacted the hype for the upcoming adaptation. For instance, the first sets of IMAX tickets were dropped a year in advance and were sold out within a day. More tickets have been released in the last month or so, and it's already setting several presales records. Meanwhile, the first reactions to The Odyssey have been positive, with many describing it as a cinematic epic.
The upcoming epic follows Odysseus (Matt Damon), who has been trying to return home to Ithaca after the Trojan War. The Odyssey features a star-studded cast, including Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, N'yong'o, Robert Pattinson, Zendaya, and Charlize Theron, among others. In addition to directing, Nolan is also the writer and co-producer with his wife Emma Thomas.
The Odyssey will release in theaters on July 17, 2026.
The Odyssey
Follow Followed R Adventure Drama Fantasy Release Date July 17, 2026 Runtime 172 Minutes Director Christopher Nolan
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Cast
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Matt Damon
Odysseus
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Tom Holland
Telemachus
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Zendaya
Athena
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Anne Hathaway
Penelope
