The Odyssey film was masterfully produced and performed but, even with its Christian veneer, was pagan and depressing. It’s been much discussed in countless reviews how the film is not entirely faithful to Homer’s original ancient epic, having been redemptively updated, with less cruelty and more human dignity, at least relative to the original.
In the film Odysseus has a form of PTSD and regrets the sacking of Troy, amid slaughter, rape and pillage. In the original poem, he has no such regret and is proud of his conquest, as anyone in his position would have been in the pagan ancient world. The strong defeat the weak, guided by the gods.
Throughout the film, the “peoples from the sea” are cited repeatedly as a savage threat. Only at the end does Odysseus realize that he and the other Greeks, in their destruction of Troy, are themselves the “peoples from the sea.” It’s a moment of rueful self-realization, the enemy, they are us, that’s more Reinhold Niebuhr than…