Actuakers One of my all time favorites.

Matialth Good concept, poorly executed.

Contentar Best movie of this year hands down!

Intcatinfo A Masterpiece!

deideiblueeyez The depiction of Greek life during the end of the Mycenaean era was accurate (as far as I've read and researched), and the costumes were exemplary. Odysseus, Anticlea, and Penelope's actors nailed their parts with nearly perfect consistence.Some parts of the movie felt a little awkward or stilted for me in regards to the delivery of the lines, such as Circe's character. Hermes was also a bit...odd. My personal image of him is that of a cheeky teenager, not the September issue for Hot Daddies Monthly, but what can you do.Much like Odysseus, I wanted the journey to just end already, and only 10% of that feeling was derived from the film's length. I was emotionally invested in his quest to return home and was overjoyed when he and Penelope finally reunited. It does succeed in breathing life into these characters and if you had to entertain your college students with a film that ties into Greek mythology, let it be this one.

Wuchak This 1997 TV movie by Andrey Konchalovskiy is an almost-three-hour rendition of Homer's Odyssey, the epic Greek poem that details Odysseus' decade of wandering from one adventure to another after his victory in the long Trojan War, trying to make it back to Ithaca, Greece, and his beloved Penelope. Armand Assante plays Odysseus, Greta Scacchi his wife and Alan Stenson their son. Some of the numerous guest stars include Isabella Rossellini, Bernadette Peters, Eric Roberts, Christopher Lee, Vanessa Williams and Michael J. Pollard.While the cast, locations and score are excellent, the story is conveyed in a relatively dull manner in the first half and is hampered by the manifestations of "the gods." Yes, I realize the filmmakers' were only trying to be true to Homer's epic, but some of these manifestations are eye-rolling and take the viewer out of the story. This explains why 1954's "Ulysses" and 2004's "Troy" played down this element or cut it out altogether. However, after the first half you start to accept it as part of the adventure/fantasy and roll with it, particularly because the second half is nigh exceptional, starting with the crew's confrontation with the three-headed Scylla, which is a truly horrific sequence, and then the entire final act, especially the action-packed fight between Odysseus & his son and the brutish suitors of Penelope.Assante isn't larger-than-life as Douglas was in "Ulysses," but he evokes Odysseus' intelligence, guile, and versatility, as shown in the poem. Once you catch a grip there are some potent scenes/acting, like the initial revelation of Odysseus with various Ithacans. Furthermore, some parts have a palpable spiritual quality. Unfortunately, it does take a while to get into the groove, but the second half is more than worth it (not to mention the score and the magnificent Mediterranean locations).Lastly, some people have erroneously summed up the moral of the film as "Don't anger the gods." While this is true on the surface, the subtext is way more than this and totally applicable to reality. It's revealed in the second half: *** SPOILER ALERT*** Odysseus was condemned to wandering from crisis to crisis for a decade because of his arrogance after his victory at Troy. Before finally returning to Ithaca we observe a humbled and enlightened man. This is the core message. Once Odysseus is humbled a potent nugget of wisdom is revealed: Sometimes it's necessary to temporarily kowtow to the arrogant in order to assess the situation and bide your time for an effective strike.The film runs 176 minutes (the VHS 165 minutes) and was shot in Turkey and Malta.GRADE: B

Robert J. Maxwell A decent cast and some tight writing make this a pretty good spectacle. Poor Odysseus (Armand Assante). He spends ten years fighting for the Greeks in the Trojan War, and it takes him another nine years to survive the return trip and reach his kingdom in Ithaca. He undergoes many adventures -- some good and some horrifying -- along the way, and meanwhile at home his wife Penelope (Greta Scacchi) is fending off dozens of suitors who believe Odysseus is dead and who want to take over his island and his wife.Why does Odysseus have such a tough time? Because he overreached. After he figured out how to get inside the walls of Troy (the Trojan Horse) he bragged aloud that he could do anything he wanted without the help of the gods. Poseidon (who later became the Roman Neptune) heard him and was royally browned off, so he regularly interfered with the sea voyage of Odysseus and his men. PO'ing the gods was one of three cardinal sins for the Greeks, called hubris. A second sin was pleonexis, being overly materialistic. I forget the third sin. I think it may have had to do with pronouncing "nuclear" as "nukyoolar." This version has a couple of good things going for it. In the DVD commentary, Assante says that the writers managed to trim it down to an adventure story, leaving out the philosophizing. But I don't remember much philosophizing in the original. If there's a message in Homer's tale it's that the dice of the gods are loaded. At least this version HAS gods in it, while other films built around The Iliad and The Oddysey have tended to eliminate them entirely and turn the sources into sword and sandal epics full of muscle men. Furthermore, these gods aren't remote, distant, humorless giants. They're playful, whimsical and sometimes spiteful, like the originals. Some episodes are deleted, like Odysseus' affair with the teen-age Nausicaa. And we don't get to see Odysseus recognized by his old dog, Argos, when he finally returns in disguise to Ithaca. I don't know why it was left out. Everybody likes dogs except people who like cats. The dialog is stylized but rendered in prose, which is okay. "Iambic pentameter helps you remember the lines." (I think that sentence is in iambic pentameter, if I counted correctly.) Homer just put that into the story to make it easier to remember. Rhymes and metric lines are memory pegs. ("Thirty days hath September....") Like "The Iliad", "The Odyssey" was an oral tradition, to be recited from memory before an audience. If you left out "wine-dark" before sea, you knew you'd messed up something in your recitation. The photography and location shooting are achingly gorgeous.The cast is full of well-known names, some of whom do better than others. Assante is a believable Odysseus. He's given some time to mourn the loss of his men, as is proper, and is allowed to weep convincingly. Of the rest, most are pretty good. Except, I must say that Vanessa Williams, a real stunner, is poorly wardrobed (when she's wearing anything) and sounds like an amateur actress compared to the others. Eric Roberts is Eurymachus, the chief suitor, and adds some touches to the role as a real scuzzbag.The special effects beat those in any other version that I'm aware of. Scylla, the multiple-headed monster who snatches men off ships and eats them, is truly spooky, looking like a highly sentient and directional Venus fly trap. Ugh. The cyclops is no better. He traps the Greeks in his cave and after eating one or two, he gets drunk until, as Homer put it in one translation, he falls asleep "dribbling liquor and bits of men." The "no-man" ruse is retained.You know something? This is a pretty good story for a whole family. The kids will learn something about ancient Greece and they'll be entertained by the (considerable) violence. A generation ago, there was a great push to discard the works of "dead, white European males" from high school and college curricula in favor of multi-culturalism. By "multi-culturalism" I didn't get the impression that anyone wanted to read the Baghavad Gita or the Analects of Confucius, just mostly contemporary works critical of Euroamerican culture. But here's a literary icon of that culture -- and it couldn't be more "other" if it tried.

Blueghost I should've been doing a number of other things when this two part television special aired many years ago. But the scope and authenticity of the production had me hooked. As with all translations of literature to the screen (big and small) there is some reworking of the root tale, and Hallmark Entertainment's offering of "The Odyssey" is no different.But, if you can ignore the truncation of the prequel "The Illiad", and the truncation of characters (Patrokles comes to mind), then you, as an English speaking audience member, should be able to enjoy this very lavish and very wide of scope television production.This is not a Greek fantasy epic of old Hollywood, where sets, costumes and social undercurrents of Greek society are cleansed for a general middle American audience. No. This production shows the Greek tale as it might have been imagined during the time it was originally told. The dirt floors of primitive dwellings, the simple skins, armor and weapons used, along with some of the musical and other artistic endeavors of the time. Classic Greek mythology is presented within an authentic Classic Greek setting.The tale tells mostly the events from the epic poem, but also gives a more down to Earth and contemporary spin by presenting the test the ancient Greek gods put forth to both King Odesseus and Queen Penelope. Admittedly because of the masculine nature of the classic tale, husband and wife are given different focuses, but both are driven to and beyond the point of temptation while still maintaining their deep love for one another.I have no real complaints about this film. Some of it was shot on Betacam and transferred to 35mm (possibly a high grade 16mm), and it shows in some of the shots. But scope of the film makes up for a minor technical quibble.A fairly good watch, and unexpected production value from a made for TV movie. The DVD could've been more complete with subtitles, and perhaps a music only audio track or commentary. But as it stands now it's enough to have this minor gem preserved on optical media.Enjoy :-)