The Odyssey

This is a fine, beautifully crafted version of Homer's The Odyssey. Armand Assante gives a sterling performance as the King of Ithica, who's journey to return from the siege of Troy leads him on a 20-odd year quest to find his way home to his beloved wife Penelope.

If you have read The Odyssey, you will know what kind of challenge it would have been to adapt it into a coherent film and the filmmakers here did a superb job. In capturing all of the excitement, enticement and rollicking adventure of the epic, they brought to life a superlative story rich in imagination.

Kudos to the fine cast, including Eric Roberts as Eurymachus, Greta Scacchi as Penelope and an arresting cameo by Christopher Lee as the blind prophet Tiresias. Eduard Artemyev melodious score only adds to the epic feel.

Not without flaws (Troy is skimmed by a little too fast, and some of the visual effects are a little clunky), but the human element of the story is well dramatized. A supremely entertaining epic.

This is probably the best TV movie of all time. Odysseus is the perfect hero for the aging 1st world population, with his use of guile to triumph when strength is not enough. Despite the fact that one of my favorite parts of The Odyssey is left out, when Odysseus returns home after 20 years, his faithful pet Argus awaiting him, only to die after one greeting; I think this is an incredibly arresting film. Armand Assante is surprising terrific as Odysseus. He conveys with his expressions the depth of thought and emotion which characterized Odysseus. All the more amazing when one considers that Odysseus was an Achaean, a tall, fair race of people, though Odysseus was, himself, described by Homer as one of middle stature, for an Achaean, no doubt. This movie makes the tales of Homer seem more real than any film I have ever seen. The emotions of all are complex and real. The mutual love and devotion of Odysseus and Penelope are portrayed in a beautiful and believable way by the actors. The scene in which Odysseus returns to take back his kingdom is brutally and believably real. I cannot say enough good things about this movie. It should be required in the schools.

Having been forced to read The Odyssey several times throughout school in clunky and stale translations, it was very refreshing to see the story brought to life like an action movie. I don't want to sound shallow by emphasizing that aspect of the epic because I do understand and appreciate the subtler nuances and motifs of Homer's poem. However, to take it out of the classroom and turn it into a popcorn movie does not do it injustice. In fact, it gave me a better appreciation of the story and a shot in the arm to give the print version another try. Which I did. And I really enjoyed it this time. Probably the fact that I didn't have an essay assignment breathing down my neck on my last reading helped immeasurably.

Anywho, I think Armand Assante was an inspired choice for Ulysses and the supporting cast was very well-chosen too, especially Greta Scacchi and Nicholas Clay. The Scylla/Charibdis and Hydra segments were the most thrilling. Perhaps the FX weren't always top-notch, but this is TV, folks. It definitely had a storybook feel to it with the bright colors and understandable dialogue. Now, if they will only make a TV miniseries of The Iliad......

I watched this movie last evening after not seeing it for at least four years and was completely absorbed by it again. I used to show it to my year eight high school classes as a tie-in to our introductory ancient history syllabus and the movie was well received. One of the most important aspects of movie/doco watching for adolescents is the time a particular scene stays before their eyes-the longer it stays the sooner adolescent-fidget sets in and the movie/doco, regardless of its inherent strength, is lost for them. Seen from this perspective, The Odyssey is a superbly made film.

Besides this superlative editing, the strength of the characters is dominant from the opening scenes and simply becomes stronger as the movie progresses, climaxing with the wonderful Calypso scene near the end. Vanessa William's superb rendition of her character is but a mirror of the other great acting roles distributed throughout the movie. It says much about the film adaptation of a mythological work that is roughly three thousand years old that the actors can make the essential humanness of the epic ring true. Dare I say it was "believable!"

If you want to view an extremely watchable movie then make every attempt to see this one-in my opinion, everything about it is fabulous!

Okay I first saw this movie when I was in 9th grade.We watched it after reading the book.I thought it was a pretty good movie from the start.The special effects were considerably good.Armand Assante played an Excellent Odysseus....I liked Armand's portrayal more than Sean Bean's (Troy).I love Greek mythology and I love this movie.I plan on buying it on DVD.The scene where the old man shoots the arrow through the loops to reveal Odysseus is amazing.Then he says "your crime is that you tried to steal my world" that part was awesome.I think if you are into Greek mythology you will like this movie.They show it on the sci-fi channel every once in a while so I think you should definitely check it out.Like it says in my summary....for a made for TV film it does pretty well.