Warning: spoilers ahead for The Odyssey.
Matt Damon. Anne Hathaway. Tom Holland. Zendaya.
In the lead-up to Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey and since its release, the lead stars of the epic blockbuster have been showered with praise by critics, who’ve labelled the film a ‘cinematic masterpiece’.
However, there’s one performance in the film that I believe deserves even more attention, that should be shouted from the rooftops to widespread acclaim – Samantha Morton as Circe.
Going into The Odyssey, I didn’t know much about it. I knew that it was a classic tale about a long and arduous journey undertaken by a man called Odysseus, and that was about it.
I’d heard that actors including Zendaya and Charlize Theron were playing gods, and that Robert Pattinson was especially skin-crawling as the snivelling villain Antinous. But as for Samantha’s role, I was in the dark.
Except for one thing that I’d heard Zendaya say in an interview. From what I could remember, she’d declared that Samantha’s performance was the one that stood out to her the most. After seeing the film myself, I understood why.
In The Odyssey, Odysseus and his men are striving to find their way back home to Ithaca following the Trojan War, after taking a riskier route across the sea where unknown perils await them.
After being trapped in a cave with the cyclops Polyphemus, who ate and killed several of their men, and then being attacked by giant warriors called the Laestrygonians, they eventually spot a house on an unknown island where they hope they’ll find food to satisfy their starving stomachs.
Odysseus’ second-in-command Eurylochus (Himesh Patel) demands that their leader stay behind, as they blame him for the misfortune that they’ve suffered. So, the majority of the men head to the house, passing creatures including a lion and a tiger as they make their way up the path.
When they arrive at the house, they meet Circe, who looks utterly terrified by the sight of the soldiers in her home.
After they assure her that they mean her no harm and would just simply be grateful for a meal to eat, she says that she’ll feed them if they leave their armour and weapons outside of the back door.
They can’t resist the whims of their empty stomachs as they gorge on Circe’s food without pausing to consider that she might be a threat.
As they eat, their hunger becomes insatiable, and they’re unable to stop stuffing food in their mouths – grotesquely, I might add.
Circe begins putting her hands on the men one by one, hideously distorting their heads and their bodies like putty to mould them into animals that she claims represent their true nature – pigs.
I went to see The Odyssey with my parents. At the sight of the witch stuffing her hands down the soldiers’ throats, reshaping their jaws, breaking their bones and elongating their noses, my mum – who was squirming in her seat – lifted her hands to block the view.
When you’re watching something horrific in a cinema, there’s only so many times that you can tell yourself that it’s make-believe. Sometimes, it’s done in a way that’s so disturbing that your brain can’t fathom that it isn’t real. That’s how we all felt watching Samantha’s Circe at work.
The Odyssey stars Tom and Anne previously explained to IMDb that the scene was done practically, without CGI. ‘When they turn the people into pigs, that’s all real. It’s all animatronics. It’s an animatronic head and she pulls their jaws apart. That’s real,’ the Spider-Man actor said.
Anne added: ‘That’s not CGI. That is a practical effect. They worked with an artist to create something that Samantha could sculpt with live on camera.’
Props have to go to the crew members who created this magnificent practical effect. But the way that Circe commanded the room in this scene stayed with me until long after I’d left the cinema.
I was revolted by what was happening, but also in a state of awe, as though I was watching an artist splash paint on a canvas. This scene should have haunted my dreams, but fortunately for me, the admiration I felt for Samantha’s performance must have stopped that from happening.
Sir Christopher Nolan has revealed that he’s only witnessed members of a crew applaud an actor twice in his career while filming a movie. The first time was for Heath Ledger when he starred as the Joker. The second was for Samantha.
After Circe has her way with the soldiers, she then meets Odysseus, who ventured to her house when he grew suspicious that the animals on the island might have previously been men.
He avoids eating Circe’s food and grabs her crow (who’s actually her sister transformed into the animal) by the neck, threatening the bird’s life while demanding that she turn his men back into their human forms.
It’s at this point that Circe reveals to Odysseus why she transformed them into pigs, and he’s forced to face some hard realities. The witch vows that his soldiers would have raped and killed her, and insists that she simply revealed who they truly are.
Nonetheless, she relents, turning them back into humans while whispering that it’s time for them to revert to their ‘disguises’ – another mic drop.
The fact that his men might not be good people is one that Odysseus might find hard to swallow, but can’t deny.
He saw how they acted when Troy was sacked – not just fighting with fellow soldiers, but attacking and killing innocent civilians too. He knows that it’s the truth, which is why he and the audience can’t pretend that Circe is a monstrous being without any cause.
There are many factors why this was one of the standout sequences of The Odyssey for me, from the practical effects to the deeper meaning behind Circe’s actions.
Most of all, I don’t believe that anyone could have played this role as spectacularly as Samantha. She went from being a nightmare personified to delivering one of the most important moral messages of the film.
Next stop – Oscar.
The Odyssey is available to watch in cinemas now.
