Every time Christopher Nolan stretches his action muscles, audiences are in for a cinematic treat. Think of the Batpod chase in The Dark Knight, the spinning-hallway shootout in Inception, or the forwards-and-backwards, time-twisting battle that closes out Tenet. After Oppenheimer found the director in talkier, dialogue-heavy territory, The Odyssey swings the other way: an all-out, action-packed summer movie. It is an epic spectacle that adapts one of the most foundational stories ever told, with Matt Damon's Odysseus battling monsters, his own demons, and the schemes of nefarious suitors as he makes the long journey home to his family in Ithaca. And then come the Laestrygonians.
A fight against marauding giants
One of the toughest tests in Odysseus's journey arrives in the form of these massive, marauding giants, who make short work of our hero's men. The sequence was shot in Scotland's Culbin Forest. To capture the all-out assault, Nolan leaned on a range of practical techniques, many of which are being kept under wraps, including forced-perspective illusions and wirework that sent stuntmen hurling through the air, all recorded by seven IMAX cameras.
For Nolan, it all comes down to the disorientation and the danger the moment presents to his protagonist. "It was a fun sequence to shoot," he said during post-production. "It's really a thing of trying to get across the brutality. They're warriors, and their weapons and armour is of a level of sophistication that Odysseus has never seen."
Not just spectacle, but a test of character
As with Odysseus's other fantastical encounters, these set-pieces challenge him on a character level while also delivering thrills for the audience. "The point of the Laestrygonians in the story, as in the original poem, is to show in some ways the questionable nature of Odysseus's leadership. To give his men reason to doubt him," Nolan explained. "And so what they come up against leaves them all shaken." In short, get ready: another Christopher Nolan action all-timer is on the way.
Alongside Matt Damon, the film also features Anne Hathaway, Tom Holland and Robert Pattinson in key roles. The Odyssey comes to cinemas from July 17.
