During its opening weekend, I had the privilege of seeing Christopher Nolans’s latest blockbuster, The Odyssey, in IMAX. And the film was nothing short of what we’ve come to expect from Nolan, with its breathtaking visuals and high-octane storytelling. Even as someone with a low attention span for prolonged battle scenes or journey montages, I was fully locked in throughout The Odyssey’s whopping 2 hour and 52 minute long runtime. But despite its overwhelmingly positive reception (including my own), I just could not get past one particular gripe I developed from the moment of its opening scene. 

The film begins with rapper, Travis Scott, as a bard reciting verses from Homer’s Odyssey. Although the scene effectively sets the tone for the rest of the film, making it feel as though we, the audience, are gathered around him as he recounts the epic of Odysseus, I couldn’t help but find his cameo bizarre and out of place. 

This trend of incorporating contemporary culture into films, even those pertaining to history or literature, isn’t new. Doja Cat’s song, Vegas, in the Elvis (2022) biopic comes to mind. Or even Ed Sheeran’s cameo in the HBO series, Game of Thrones. I have to admit, I laughed out loud when the scene had shifted from the show’s usual medieval drudgery to Sheeran singing songs around a campfire. As someone who grew up during the height of Ed Sheeran’s career, my mind immediately filled with memories of seeing his face on the covers of teen magazines like Tiger Beat and Seventeen throughout the 2000s. At that moment, a seemingly random pop star appearance had completely taken me out of the episode’s immersion, proving that unnecessary celebrity cameos can singlehandedly ruin the tone of any film or tv show. 

Travis Scott’s opening scene marks the beginning of an endless string of obnoxious cameos throughout the film. From the 75 credited cast members, nearly all of them are Hollywood A-listers. Odysseus is, of course, played by Matt Damon. His wife, Penelope, is played by Anne Hathaway. Zendaya stars as Athena, and Tom Holland, her real life husband, as Telemarchus. I really could go on, but the roster is unending: Charlize Theron, Mia Goth, Robert Pattinson, John Bernthal, Elliot Page. Just to name a few. 

This kind of star-studded casting reminds me of a meme I’ve seen floating around the internet for a few years now. The image describes someone’s perfect dream cast for a Teen Titans movie with Timothee Chalamet, Jenna Ortega, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson… and Tom Holland and Zendaya. Someone hilariously responded to the original post with “bro started watching

movies 2 weeks ago”. Ironically, it seems like Christopher Nolan has the same obvious casting tastes as this random Twitter user. 

And I know, Nolan is known for huge all-star casts, but I just don’t feel as though this works for a piece like The Odyssey: a story so old and cemented into cultural memory. It just doesn’t do the story justice to cast overly botoxed and face-lifted movie stars for every single role. It would be like making a movie about the Bible and casting Nicholas Cage as Joseph or FKA Twigs as Mary… oh yeah, they’ve done that one too. 

But every time Robert Pattinson’s character appeared, I couldn’t help but think of his roles in Twilight or Harry Potter or The Batman. When it was John Bernthal’s moment on the screen, my mind raced to the hilariously embarrassing videos of him bragging about how he doesn’t need to take naps. Naps are for the birds.

And I might be alone on this one, but I feel like Anne Hathaway’s performance was the absolute worst of them all. Every line was delivered in a way that sounded so… Anne Hathaway. The way she speaks: her accent, her cadence, her intonation is way more Orange County than ancient Greece. Her role in The Odyssey could just as easily have been Andrea Sachs in the Devil Wears Prada 3 as it was Penelope, Queen of Ithaca. 

But there’s so many other filmmakers out there who like to pack their casts with famous actors. One of my favorites, Robert Eggers, had a great star-studded ensemble for his last film, Nosferatu (2024) with Bill Skarsgard, Lily-Rose Depp, Nicholas Hoult, Ralph Ineson, and more. But these particular actors, many of which frequently star in historical movies already, just make sense in Eggers’ world. I would never laugh at Ralph Ineson making an appearance in a Victorian-era role. Brad Pitt, on the other hand, absolutely. I actually had to pause Interview with the Vampire (1994) 20 minutes in because I was in tears over his brawl scene with Tom Cruise. To this day, no movie has made me laugh harder. 

Even some of Nolan’s other films, like Oppenheimer (2023), do better with casting. I guess Christopher Nolan simply lacks taste for casting movies placed in ancient Greece. I will say, one role I was very happy with was Benny Safdie as King Agamemnon. There was truly no better person for that role. More of that please, Mr. Nolan!

What do you think of The Odyssey casting? Let us know in the comments!