Boy, when you take a step back and put things in perspective, we’re about to have a big summer at the movies. Kai Ryssdal and company are gonna have to find something else to talk about for the back half of a Marketplace broadcast (have you tried the circular deals at the heart of the AI boom, or the looming data center apocalypse? You have? Well, try harder!), because if anything should stress the need to go to a movie theater* for an experience you can’t have on your fucking telephone it’s the new trailer for Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey.
Good lord, friends: This is shaping up to be one hell of a movie. Universal dropped the trailer last night during the NBA playoffs, presumably to accompany any number of classic-centric jokes one could make about the games. Or, rather, they would have if old school literary sportswriters needed some meatballs from the mound to swing at in their columns.
Peep it:
You don’t need a goddamned studio-authored synopsis for The Odyssey, so we’re not giving you one. Go read it. Seriously.
In lieu of that, though, we will instead complain about the notion of “historical accuracy” applying to a work of folklore, one involving: One-eyed man-eating giants; communion with the spirits of the dead; nymphs who can turn men into pigs; creatures who can make you jump overboard with lust; Gods who really hate it when you kill their cattle; and sea monsters who have the torsos of women striding atop dog-heads and tentacles. Truly, modern turns of phrase are absolutely corrosive to one’s suspension of disbelief.
Anyhow! The Odyssey hits theaters on July 17. Hope you got your tickets… last year.
* Also, it’s still one of the cheapest out-of-home entertainment and cultural enrichment options you have available, especially if you know how to use pockets to smuggle snacks into a theater! That’s not an endorsement, but come on.