The Odyssey: Greek Tragedy of Nolan Proportions

Nolan has done it again: another box office blockbuster with the usual Nolan idiosyncrasies (and more), all ready to fetch him or his crew (or both) many Oscar nominations and a few awards, on top of the big money ($123.5 million at home, $263.7 million globally till date and counting)

So, you can decry the bizarre adaptation of Homer's epic poem as much as you like: how the script is ludicrous, how the pacing sucks, how jaded Damon appears, how the casting and costumes are a cruel joke, how self-defeating the scale of the spectacle is, how brutally has the F word trivialised the mythology, how ....you can go on...

but the fact of the matter is that Nolan knows well what sells well, and how the rest can go to hell: the film has covered its budget in a weekend and will only soar from here on. Nolan, like always, will laugh all the way to the bank.

No wonder, he reportedly commands a net worth of close to $250 million, which is the budget of his latest venture minus the marketing cost.

As for us, mere mortals, we have better non-financial options if we don't subscribe to Nolan Universe.

We can learn more about Homer, whether he was a single historical individual, or a composite of poets, and read the story of Odysseus, his decade-old struggle of homecoming post the Trojan war, surviving the wrath of sea god Poseidon, terror of Cyclops Polyphemus, maze of sorceress Circe, and the threat from monsters Scylla and Charybdis. Or we can delve deep into James Joyce's Ulysses, or may be have another go at the Coen bro hilarity 'O Brother, Where Art Thou'.

If that doesn't seem like a great idea, we can always crowdsource to make Nolan richer.

PS: The funny part is that, knowing well what Nolan was bound to offer and having already exercised all the non-financial options, we still went ahead and spent our hard-earned dollars at the AMC Lincoln Square, and even suffered the thundering applause at the end with a broad smile: this was a Greek tragedy of Null Proportions.

PS: the actor that made our time, effort and expense worthwhile was the lovely dog who played Argos, Odysseus's faithful companion who waited a lifetime for his master and died only after recognising him instantly (even in the beggar's disguise) one last time. This part is also the one where Nolan's script is most faithful to the subject matter.