Nolan speaks with pride about the level of research that went into the production from all departments, especially considering our Bronze Age knowledge is based on “very fragmentary archeological records.” When the trailer dropped, classics buffs complained about Agamemnon’s armor—dark, shiny, and reminiscent of Nolan’s Batsuit. But what struck some as fantastical Nolan defends as feasible. “There are Mycenaean daggers that are blackened bronze. The theory is they probably could have blackened bronze in those days. You take bronze, you add more gold and silver to it and then use sulfur,” says Nolan. “With Agamemnon, Ellen [Mirojnick], our costume designer, is trying to communicate how elevated he is relative to everyone else. You do that through materials that would be very expensive.”
Nolan offers equally thorough explanations for every production choice, from the boats to the weapons, all of which draw on both the Bronze Age and Homer’s era, hundreds of years later. “The oldest depictions of Homeric characters tend to be depicted in the manner of people living in Homer’s time,” he says. “So there’s a pretty strong case there for portraying things that way because that’s the way the first audience received the story.”
by ChiefLeef22
46 Comments
WHAT ABOUT ‘DADDY’, CHRIS?!
>especially considering our Bronze Age knowledge is based on “very fragmentary archeological records.” When the trailer dropped, classics buffs complained about Agamemnon’s armor—dark, shiny, and reminiscent of Nolan’s Batsuit. But what struck some as fantastical Nolan defends as feasible. “There are Mycenaean daggers that are blackened bronze. The theory is they probably could have blackened bronze in those days. You take bronze, you add more gold and silver to it and then use sulfur,” says Nolan. “With Agamemnon, Ellen [Mirojnick], our costume designer, is trying to communicate how elevated he is relative to everyone else. You do that through materials that would be very expensive.”
The boys and girls over at r/AskHistorians might have a couple three things to say about this.
Would it be rude to ping u/iphikrates? (He’s the “Dutch Ditch” historian on youtube). That sub is gonna be inundated with these questions post-release anyway.
This isn’t a historical epic, it’s a myth. Anyone criticising anachronisms/inaccuracies is being silly.
Last I checked, cyclops and sirens and mystical magicka aren’t historical either. Granted I haven’t read NatGeo in awhile but correct me if I’m wrong that *all this shit is made up…*
IDK man, that’s a lot of words, but I am looking at this picture and that to me just looks like a plastic halloween costume
a picture is worth a thousand words, as they say
I never had an issue with the art direction. It’s a myth. But the new trailer… I may have an issue with the dialogue.
Troy also went the same route, and I can’t think of many Greek epic movies that *didn’t* use the same motif. It is weird seeing people criticize the historical accuracy, accents, language and such for a fantasy epic such as this
This doesn’t seem like an overly casual “Shakespeare in the park” take on The Odyssey either
People would HATE if they used the actual Mycenaean armor of the time. It almost completely covers the face. I remember looking it up when the first images came out and dorks complained. It would look so goofy and you wouldn’t see the actors face or mouths.
Film director makes artistic choices, more at 11
Nolan is my favorite director and I plan on seeing this day 1 in IMAX. I’m sure the movie will be epic and the theatre experience will be top tier. However, the trailers have not done much for me. Someone posted side by side videos of Troy vs this film and man Troy just looked so much better. I’ll take it with a grain of salt though because that is just the trailer and what they’re deciding to show us for now.
This is like saying the armor and weapons in the Lord of the Rings isn’t historically accurate, because the Rohirrim would mostly use spears instead of short swords and would wear dull plate while mounted.
My guy trying to sell snake oil accuracy again,after Interstellar.
historical accuracy? That shit never happened lol.
This wouldn’t have been an issue twenty years ago.
Reddits gonna be so confused when this movie makes a gillion dollars and is reviewed well
His reasoning behind Agamemnon’s armor is exactly what I assumed it was. The internet dialogue (normal people don’t care) around this film is already exhausting though. His point of “you don’t have to agree with everything but I hope you can still enjoy the film and know we didn’t make decisions without reason.” Is about as good of an answer you can give because some people have already made up their mind and nothing he says will change that until the film is out.
Dialogue is my biggest complaint, I can’t comment on costumes since I have no knowlege about the subject matter.
I like that we’re already getting ahead of the flood of “well ackshually” think pieces on historical accuracy that will surely flood this sub whenever the film is released.
Breaking news: weirdo complainers on the internet find something to complain about
Also the cyclops aren’t historically accurate. GAWD
Your second paragraph isn’t from this article?
I like his comment about casting Travis Scott. Kinda hilarious to imagine Nolan listening to rap though and I do wish he cast a different rapper…
Nolan just shut all you Redditors up!
It’s not a fucking historical drama. It’s a fairy tale. It’s literally not historical. Odysseus wasn’t real. The cyclops wasn’t real.
Why do the characters speak English? Doesn’t seem historically accurate smh
Honestly, I was kind of thrown off by the modern-sounding speech and accents in the trailer, but I had to check myself. Because what was I expecting, exactly?
British accents and Shakespeare-lite dialogue for a myth that happened anywhere from 3000 BCE onwards? That’s just me being used to decades of Hollywood inaccuracy that’s become normalized!
And let’s say Nolan *did* make the choice to have the entire movie performed in Ionic Greek…who the fuck would actually know the difference? It’s like *The Passion of the Christ*. I don’t have a clue whether or not the actors were doing a good job of their Aramaic lines, and neither did 99% of the viewing audience. It’s something you do for the sake of claiming authenticity, whatever that means.
But Homer’s poems were written to resonate and connect with people at *that point in time*. And the same was true for Shakespeare. And while there’s an argument for preserving the nuances and choices of the original authors, that’s already a lost cause when you’re doing an adaptation. That’s the *point* of an adaptation: You adapt.
So, yeah. Everyone speaking in clear, conversational Modern English is kind of exactly what Homer was doing, and was also what Emily Wilson was doing in her excellent re-translation of the source text. Her work is clearly poetic and stylized but not trying to sound Olde Timey, because that’s mostly a bullshit invention that rarely has much historical backing to it.
It sounds like Nolan is going for “Things That Could Feasibly Exist Around 8th Century BCE Greece,” so that feels like the standard he should be held to once history nerds start picking apart the film.
those are bullshtit excuses for a 3d printed batsuit that they can’t fix in post. there’s two entirely different universes of design language between agammennon’s attire and Odisseus’s in this picture alone.
I’m excited to see this movie and form my own personal, nuanced opinion that it’s either the greatest film ever made or a death blow to all art as we know it. Or I guess it’s technically possible my opinion lands somewhere in the middle.
I care far less about the armor than the Viking longship, honestly.
You critique the armor in the Odyssey because of historical accuracy. I critique the armor in the Odyssey because it looks like sigma dogshit. We are not the same.
Fuck it I’m here for it
And funny enough i thought Neal Adams’ Batman Odyssey was a fun graphic novel
Wonder if sound mixing in Tenet was also an artistic choice
Eh, it doesn’t really need to be historically accurate, but it should probably feel authentic to the time period it’s set in and the source material it’s trying to adapt. From the casting choices to the costume designs it seems like he missed the mark with this one.
Good news for all the dorks that cry about this kinda stuff, you can just skip the movie
Despite this article’s claim to the contrary I did not find any explanation, let alone a thorough one, for why they appear to be going around in a Viking longship
My biggest complaint still is the run time. Some things will have to be cut and that’s unfortunate.
The real question is if the cyclops and Circe will be historically accurate
Don’t care about any internet drama but damn this helmet is horrible ahahahah.
I just hope they use historically accurate pig men
Assumed this was the reasoning and I get it. I just don’t know how much a spartan king would’ve cared about status like that. But I don’t think it’s going to ruin the interpretation.
I’m so excited ahhhhh
Couldn’t he have made the other characters dress with more colors then, to make Agamemnon more elevated? Because one guy dressed in all black doesn’t stand out too much from a bunch of guys wearing muted browns and greys. Or just change the color grading so everything doesn’t look washed out.
The odyssey shouldn’t be totally historically accurate its a fantasy story to begin with
I dont remember people getting upset by the historical accuracy of the movie 300
man people really see a black helmet and immediately start getting batman flashbacks. it’s been over a decade let it go lol
Cinephile nerds are annoying. Hair can be one strand short, ughhhh historically inaccurate.