{"id":1137,"date":"2026-07-24T07:37:40","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T07:37:40","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/nationallogisticspost.com\/?p=1137"},"modified":"2026-07-24T07:37:40","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T07:37:40","slug":"five-quick-things-the-iliad-over-nolans-the-odyssey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nationallogisticspost.com\/?p=1137","title":{"rendered":"Five Quick Things: The Iliad<\/i> Over Nolan\u2019s The Odyssey<\/i>"},"content":{"rendered":"
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I<\/span>\u2019m just here for long enough to check this box, and then it\u2019s back to finishing the first draft of The Necessary Men<\/em>. Marco Rubio made that a little harder this week by releasing the and its export of communist revolution all over the place, including here; I\u2019m not going to get into that in the 5QT, because after having read it I decided I\u2019m going to do a longer thing on it this weekend.<\/p>\n

Read more Judges Should Not Cave to Preferred Pronouns<\/a><\/p>\n

So look forward to that, I guess, though it definitely won\u2019t be a happy column.<\/p>\n

And let\u2019s get this started\/over with, depending on your perspective.<\/p>\n

1. Stop That Fighting. It\u2019s Just a Movie.<\/h2>\n

I\u2019m not exactly sure when we as conservatives were conscripted into the Christopher Nolan fan club. I don\u2019t remember having signed the membership form; it just seems like it came in the mail already filled out, and I neglected to throw it away, or something.\u00a0(RELATED: When Homer Meets Hollywood)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Nolan, who made excellent films with his Dark Knight<\/em> series starring Christian Bale as Batman and whose treatment of the British evacuation at Dunkirk was masterful, is an excellent filmmaker when he wants to be.<\/p>\n

But he\u2019s not perfect. He certainly has a very healthy self-esteem, which sometimes gets him in trouble \u2014 when critics and audiences rightly praised Inception<\/em>, though it bordered on an abuse of the audience with its hyper-complicated plot, Nolan decided that gave him license to make Tenet<\/em>, which is one of the least watchable or intelligible films ever made.<\/p>\n

And while as a film project Oppenheimer<\/em> was undoubtedly a win, Nolan got the fundamental premise wrong. The fact is that whether Robert Oppenheimer was a communist or not really didn\u2019t make much of a difference; it was on his watch that the Soviets stole our nuclear secrets, and for that reason he was rightly pushed aside as the head of our nuclear program. Nolan utterly glossed over that point, which in reality was central \u2014 the scientist\u2019s political leanings and motivations could have been anything; the job he was given was to develop nuclear weapons that gave America an advantage over our enemies, and when that advantage was lost he was ultimately a failure in his job after having been a rousing success who saved many lives by creating Fat Man and Little Boy.<\/p>\n

The point being that while I generally like Christopher Nolan\u2019s movies, I\u2019m fully aware that he can hook one into the next fairway.<\/p>\n

And he\u2019ll also pander to the Left.<\/p>\n

Nolan was beaten about the head and shoulders for not casting any\u00a0 \u201cblack or brown\u201d people in Dunkirk<\/em>, which was one of the stupidest film critiques in the history of Western culture. The reason he didn\u2019t cast any black people in Dunkirk<\/em> is that there weren\u2019t any black people in Dunkirk when the British troops were evacuated from there. But it\u2019s obvious that Nolan took that criticism to heart, because the casting of The Odyssey<\/em>, which Ben Shapiro and the staff of National Review<\/em> have somehow insisted conservatives should embrace along with the film itself, is the opposite of what Nolan did in Dunkirk<\/em>.\u00a0(RELATED: The Left Wanted the Culture War They\u2019re Now Losing)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Casting Lupita Nyong\u2019o as Helen of Troy, or Travis Scott as a Greek bard, or Ellen\/Elliott Page as a Greek warrior, or Himesh Patel as Eurylochus \u2014 these are horrific casting decisions which detract from the story. Even if they\u2019re good in those roles \u2014 and I haven\u2019t seen the film, which I\u2019ll get to in a second, but I haven\u2019t seen any positive reviews of any of those portrayals \u2014 those casting decisions detract from its consistency and watchability. (RELATED: Hollywoke\u2019s Last Gasp \u2014 Race and Gender Swapping)<\/strong><\/p>\n

And stop it with the \u201cOh, but this is a myth\u201d thing being a justification for bad casting. No, it\u2019s a GREEK myth. This is Greek culture being appropriated. Why is it OK to make casting decisions which are obvious departures from the source material? Especially when by doing so, you\u2019re insulting the culture you\u2019re drawing from.<\/p>\n

Yes, Diane Kruger was a questionable Helen of Troy the last time somebody did a cinematic treatment of this material; she\u2019s German, not Greek. But this was worse than that. To be honest, Matt Damon as Odysseus is pretty questionable, too, but at least there were ancient Greeks who looked like Damon. But Lupita Nyong\u2019o as Helen of Troy and Himesh Patel as Eurylochus are bad casting in the same way John Wayne as Genghis Khan is bad casting. At least the Duke was sure to generate box office; since when are any of these people a draw?<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s remember that somebody has already done a quite masterful not-so-historical reinterpretation of The Odyssey<\/em>. If you want to watch that, go and stream O Brother, Where Art Thou?<\/em> Trust me, you\u2019ll find it much more entertaining.<\/p>\n

To me, Nolan\u2019s movie is irreparably harmed by the bad casting. And of course it was done to appease Woke Hollywood and to give the movie a shot at winning Oscars given the Academy\u2019s stupid rules about minorities and trans weirdos having to fill a certain quota of the cast and so on. We all get that, and maybe Nolan thinks he\u2019s obligated to play that game.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m not necessarily embracing Steve Deace or Matt Walsh with respect to their takes on this thing, either \u2014 because I haven\u2019t seen it. Deace and Walsh lit into The Odyssey<\/em> with significant relish, and not just because of the casting; both of them said it was boring and stupid even outside of that flaw. Walsh notes that Patel giving the line \u201cWe are Greeks from Ithaca\u201d is unintentionally the funniest part of the film, and I\u2019d have to agree that\u2019s a bit of a self-own.<\/p>\n

But I haven\u2019t seen it, so I\u2019m not going to judge. And I\u2019m not heading to the theater to see it. It\u2019ll undoubtedly come to one of the streaming platforms I subscribe to, and I\u2019ll see it then. But I\u2019m under no obligation to see a movie which wants me to believe Ellen Page is a Greek warrior. That\u2019s too much work for me to do, just like trying to follow the plot of Tenet<\/em> was too much work for me to do. Especially when I\u2019m the one paying rather than getting paid.<\/p>\n

And yes, Nolan is an excellent filmmaker when he wants to be. He does occasionally do work which advances, or at least preserves to an extent, Western cultural values. I don\u2019t have to give him grace when he fails at that project despite having more than a half-billion dollars to spend on it that maybe<\/em> he\u2019ll make back.<\/p>\n

So miss me with all the bellyaching about this. I\u2019m going to assume this is a mediocre film which probably would have been better with smarter decision-making, and because of that it\u2019s for streaming when I\u2019ve got nothing else to do. I don\u2019t have to watch it, and I\u2019m not paying to, and let\u2019s move on. I hear Young Washington<\/em> is terrific; maybe I\u2019ll go and see that while it\u2019s still in the theaters.\u00a0(RELATED: Young Washington<\/i>: No Cherry Tree Required)<\/strong><\/p>\n

2. Brandon Gill Destroys the Head of the American Bar Association<\/h2>\n

I thought the ABA was the professional association that governed the lawyers all over the country. In fact, I\u2019m pretty sure that\u2019s the case.<\/p>\n

Given that, it would have seemed to me that to get to be the president of the ABA, people would have to think you\u2019re a good lawyer.<\/p>\n

Except I don\u2019t think that\u2019s true right now.<\/p>\n

And I don\u2019t think it\u2019s true because Michelle A. Behnke is the president of the ABA, and the clip of her getting questioned by Rep. Brandon Gill, who\u2019s a House Freedom Caucus member from Texas, gave me the impression that Ms. Behnke is something of a hack who might be in that job for reasons other than that her peers think she\u2019s a great lawyer.\u00a0(RELATED: <\/strong>Texas and Florida Shatter the ABA\u2019s Gatekeeping Power<\/strong>)<\/strong><\/p>\n

Great lawyers don\u2019t get tied up in bows like this\u2026<\/p>\n