I was just astounded at the Cyclops scenes in the cave. Deeply chilling and jaw-dropping. I don't care how the movie was made, the special effects, practical or CGI or both, were perfect.
Matt Damon plays the war weary father well. Tom Holland, famous for playing our modern teenager grappling with adult responsibilities (Peter Parker) is almost too perfectly cast as the original prince who needs to become king. Anne Hathaway is so sunny in interviews, she comes across as a eager-to-please try-hard theater kid, but only for the press. Her Penelope is steely and rigid as the Queen backed into an impossible position. Did Robert Pattinson ever play a hero, or did we always want to like him despite his talent for playing a dark soul? I love John Leguizamo as Eumaeus, his role feels very familiar to another outsider who has to explain to the villains that the protagonist is an unstoppable killing machine that they should be afraid of - just like in John Wick!
I love Charlize Theron, but why was her Calypso willing to let Odysseus go home? My reading of the book is that she would keep Odysseus forever if she could, but she's forced to release him by the gods. In this movie, she came across more as a steward who patiently waited for Odysseus to be emotionally prepared to return home, like a therapist with a fishing net for a top instead of a cardigan.
Lupita Nyong'o is a terrifically talented actress, but I think it was a mistake to cast her as sisters, especially sisters that are historically not twins, and they even wear matching purple costumes! Nyong'go is introduced as Helen in an early scene with her husband King Menelaus, but we never meet Clytemnestra except in brief flashes, much later. This was an especially frustrating misstep considering Christopher Nolan's economical-to-a-fault visual storytelling. When the dead soul of Menelaus (Benny Safdie) explains that Odysseus should not expect a hero's welcome upon his return home, we are presented with flashes of Menelaus being murdered by his wife Clytemnestra, and also Clytemnestra screaming with grief as her daughter is sacrificed. If Nolan wants the audience to connect the dots between anecdotes told by characters onscreen with wordless flashes of scenes onscreen, you can choose to make those "scenes" mere seconds long, but it's an unnecessary handicap to cast Nyong'o as twin sisters in identical costumes and expect even the most attentive viewer to keep up.
One more note: the Circe scenes, turning the men into pigs and back again, creeped me out deep into my core. I think the last body horror movie I saw was The Fly forty years ago, and that one wasn't coded as an indictment of masculinity. BLERG.
The tension of the final reveal of Odysseus in his castle, and the boss battle that follows, was perfectly calibrated. It was great how Odysseus was able to fight off men in hand-to-hand combat, how he struggled more and more as more weapons were dropped into the room, but also, how a minority of the trapped suitors yielded by dropping to one knee as the battle progressed.
Obviously I recommend this movie, but the R rating should be taken seriously. The Circe scene and the Cyclops scene alone can give your kids nightmares.