For months, criticisms of Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster adaptation of “The Odyssey” have been brewing. Nolan’s multiracial cast appears to reflect the Oscars’ diversity requirements rather than how Greeks looked at the time. None of the principal characters were played by a Greek, and the only Greek-descended actor played a minor role. Odysseus’s son called him “Dad.” A rapper with visible tattoos did spoken word in an opening scene. Even the progressive translator of Homer’s The Odyssey said the film had “nothing convincing to say.”
And yet no journalist had asked Nolan tough questions about his choices until a Chinese graduate student did so a few days ago. The interview went viral on social media over the weekend. “Homer’s tone was celebratory, victorious, and your tone is emphatically not,” noted Yiyang Zhuge, a PhD student in political science at Boston College. “Does that say something about our age? Are you a bard for a civilization at dusk?”
