I don’t know but a vast majority of people are completely fine with White anglo-saxons constantly pretending to be Mediterranean. Just make Viking movies if they want old stories.
I didn’t say that. But it’s a good point. Where do you draw the line on “historical accuracy”? None of it happened. So to pick apart some parts of this version because “not historically accurate” is silly versus at the end of the day none of this story happened. So you can dress them exactly like Greek dressed then and make them speak Ancient Greek and cast modern(?) Greek actors or use grok ai or whatever and then what? That somehow makes it a better movie?
There is no “line” to draw. It’s only about being faithful to the source material, the source material states the time period so it’s best to make something that respresants said period
Where do you draw the line on “historical accuracy”? None of it happened.
Between "story" and "setting". The characters and events are fictional, but the story is still set in a real place and in a real period of history, so they would've used real historical clothing, armor, weapons, ships, and so on. Seeing supposed ancient Greeks sailing around in viking longships and wearing costumes that look like they came straight out of Game of Thrones or Rings of Power or whatever just makes me sad. Imagine if they made, say, a Robin Hood movie and had the knights wear Roman legionary armor. Would that be okay because "none of it happened"?
That somehow makes it a better movie?
Unironically yes. There's a great video about Robert Eggers and his work on The Witch, specifically about his obsessive attention to detail and historical accuracy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5qdP7lr8kI4
In interviews, Eggers makes the point that getting the mundane details right makes the supernatural elements more believable too.
they made romeo and juliet with gunfights. if ancient greeks had ak-74[sic] it would probably be a deliberate artistic choice by the filmmaker and would be judged differently than the historical accuracy
It's an epic fantasy set within a known historical time period. It's not a fantasy setting, just an ancient one.
That doesn't mean it can't be accurate to what is known of the period, and just because it features mythological creatures doesn't mean it wouldn't be jarring if Odysseus used an iPhone.
Books 5-12, which have almost all the famous scenes, all take place in fantasy lands. The identification of Scheria with Corfu, the Cyclopes' island with Sicily, etc, are all extremely late add-ons and unrelated to the bronze age origins of the poem.
That's like saying Harry Potter doesn't take place in a fantasy setting, but rather just a slightly retro one, because it takes place in Scotland. Odysseus literally sails a boat to the Underworld, just as one example.
doesn't mean it wouldn't be jarring if Odysseus used an iPhone.
An iPhone would be out of place in Harry Potter, too... That has nothing to do with it being a fantasy setting or not.
Ok then make the entire Harry Potter cast Russian, and set in Siberia. With a full Russian language script.
It was written as having taken place in Scotland, so you would expect to have Anglo-saxons, speaking British English, playing the characters in a film adaptation of Harry Potter.
Ok then make the entire Harry Potter cast Russian, and set in Siberia. With a full Russian language script.
Why not? We make American adaptations of foreign works (complete with American actors, American settings, and American-dialect English-language scripts) all the time.
so you would expect to have Anglo-saxons, speaking British English, playing the characters
Sure, and you'd probably expect the same thing of a biography of Alexander Hamilton.
Yet Hamilton is one of the best-received works in the last 20 years. And that's not even based on a fictional or fantastical source material, but literal nonfiction.
I mean, yes? Harry Potter doesn't take place in a fantasy setting. It takes place in 1990s Britain with urban fantasy elements. Just because there are witches and wizards doesn't mean, as you yourself note, that it wouldn't be immune to jarring anachronisms.
That's obviously pretty different to, say, Thedas or Tattoine, which are wholly invented.
Likewise, the Odyssey is set in ancient Hellas. That it's also an epic with Hellenic mythology elements doesn't change that. It's not like Hellas didn't actually exist or that we know nothing about it. Ergo, it can be critiqued on that basis.
Yeah, there are descriptions and many statues of Greek gods, they are always depicted as perfect Greeks, not as Africans.
It’s not about being racist, it’s about realism, how would you feel if there was a movie about African culture and African gods were played by white people?
The historical context of the Odyssey is that people from 2 neighboring villages that were loyal to different rulers would slit each others’ throat. Not a single man in Greece would’ve fought for an African woman.
Egyptians aren’t subsaharans. They’re white (meditteranean)
I haven’t heard of that movie.
Either way, cast people that look historically accurate to the geographic location. Just because someone did that with white actors shouldn’t be an excuse to do it with black actors. It just makes the movie so nonsensical and stupid
They’ve used written sources to make those statues.
The written sources portray them as idealized greeks.
Also lots of statues and myths developed alongside each other, but yes the most famous ones belong to the classical period which was around 200 years after
Nope what would that even mean? The odyssey is an old story and didn’t occur. So what would be “historically accurate” about it? You can’t make a “historically accurate” lord of the rings movies or a “historically accurate” Star Wars movie. They didn’t occur.
Bruh, are you for real? The Odyssey takes place in real locations accross the Medditerranean. LotR and Star Wars happen in made up places. Apples and Oranges.
Ancient Greeks were not. Because “white” didn’t exist. If you suggested to an Ancient Greek that Matt Damon was like them, they’d laugh at you at best. More likely they’d spit on you for the terrible insult.
But the Odyssey is literally being portrayed by WASPs, not Greeks. That’s the annoying part. The White Brits and Americans shouldn’t be pretending to be Greek.
Its possible. There are shows that pulled it off beautifully like Barbarians, where the Romans all spoke classical latin. It would be set in the Myceanian period of Greece. thats when the war with Troy took place.
The Illiad was inspired by real events and set in a real era of time. The events themselves were just fantastical.
The Indiana Jones movies were fantasie but they were still very much set in a historic context and in a specific time.
Ah yes. What the Trump voters really want is a movie filled with Mediterranean people speaking Latin. As long as kid Rock does the soundtrack it will be a huge hit!
You realize Passion of the Christ is in Aramaic and Latin with zero English and was basically a giant hit because of conservatives right? Made over half a billion dollars on a 30 million dollar budget lol
Any why is there so much concern about the “accuracy” of this fantasy movie? It’s been adapted multiple times. Or like the story only makes sense if there are Greeks playing Greeks and everyone speaks Latin? It’s got a cyclops in it. Sit back and enjoy.
And they would be speaking Ancient Greek, not Latin. I’d even be okay with Modern Greek. Hell, make it in English. Just give me Greek/Mediterranean actors, and at least a substantial amount of Greek dialogue.
Because the biggest people complaining about the actors and “accuracy” in this version are upset that Elliott Page and Lupita Nyong’o are in it. No complaints about the accuracy or inaccuracy of the rest of the cishet white cast. It’s very clear what they are upset about.
Yeah but by the time the Odyssey was written down it already had elements of the then-present mixing with elements of the era it's supposed to depict, so there's already a question of "accurate to the text or to the era?"
The idea that "this needs to depict the era accurately" is just as much a concession to modern sensibilities as anything right-wing douchebags are filling their diapers about.
Fair point. I would just have liked too to see Myceanian culture portrayed in a cool way. As we rarely see it. Nolen just made choices he made and its probably a great movie which i am gonna see. O brother were art thou was great too and that was a completetly different adaptation.
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u/Substantial-Ad2200 6h ago
“Historically accurate depiction of an ancient fantasy story.”