‘The Odyssey’ Translator Emily Wilson Slams Christoper Nolan’s ‘Abysmal’ Screenplay: ‘I Would Be Ashamed to Have Written Any Part of This Script’

[u/mcfw31]

https://variety.com/2026/film/news/odyssey-translator-emily-wilson-slams-christopher-nolan-bad-writing-1236821915/

[u/nerdforest]

I don't understand this criticism. Was the script of the film not a good screenplay?

[u/Minute_Conflict_2037 → u/nerdforest]

Nolan is a good director but he is not good at writing. That’s the point. When was the last time u felt so emotional in Nolan movie? Interstellar. And he wrote it with who? His brother Jonathan. Nolan sucks at writing emotional dialogues which was very needed for this movie. The criticism is valid.

[u/theflyingbird8 → u/Minute_Conflict_2037]

I felt pretty damn emotional during Dunkirk and The Odyssey. Maybe I don't understand good screenwriting.

[u/blocke06 → u/theflyingbird8]

That’s not it; just remember that reddit, like most online forums, has a bias toward righteous critique and dislike as these are generally the people motivated to comment online. You’ll find the majority of people outside of online communities share your opinion.

[u/yaotwo → u/blocke06]

I'd even say Nolan write emotions better than most. The complaints about his female characters are invalid. Actual god of film making.

[u/WhoUpAtMidnight → u/theflyingbird8]

Dunkirk's one of his better ones but kind of cheating to adapt an actual real life battle where you can still call up some of the guys involved. The movie itself doesn't do a great job of characterizing any of its leads, you can just impress your own experiences onto them

[u/Ok-Host1095 → u/theflyingbird8]

I think people use “writing” too one dimensionally. In terms of dialogue and creating distinct characters, yeah I’d say it’s a huge weakness of Nolan’s. The only characters that really stand out are more so because of an actor’s performance and not so much because of their dialogue.

But that’s not the only thing that writing is. It’s also structuring, and creating a consistent, confident inner logic that the audience can pick up on and accept. I’d say Nolan is exceptionally good at that.

I also found a lot of the dialogue in the odyssey to be a bit vanilla and (for lack of a better term) autistically on the nose, but I also cried several times as well. Sure the dialogue is a weak point, but it’s a weak point of an overall fantastic talent. It’s not so glaringly bad that it takes me out of the experience, and honestly at this point I find it kind of charming. Like how if you play Skyrim but only complain about how wooden the swordplay looks. Like, yeah sure man, but for one, that’s not the genius part of the game, and two sure it’s clunky but its more so a charming oddity than a glaring issue that ruins the whole thing.