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The gods are nowhere to be seen<\/strong><\/p>\n One of the most radical choices Nolan made was to not cast the majority of the gods of Olympus (with the exception of Zendaya as Athena). \u201cI became more interested in the idea that to people in that period, evidence of gods was everywhere,\u201d he explained to Time<\/em>. For example, in Bronze Age Greece, thunder and rain had no scientific explanation, they were seen merely as the will of the immortals. In the film, we see these phenomena without ever seeing the gods themselves: the storm is Poseidon\u2019s wrath, the wind filling the sails. The exception is Athena, who continues to appear to Odysseus.<\/p>\n How It Was Filmed<\/strong><\/p>\n Ninety-one days of filming, wrapped up nine days ahead of schedule (Nolan has reportedly never gone over schedule or budget on any of his films). Six countries were involved: Morocco, Greece, Italy, Iceland, Scotland, and the United States. The Sicilian scenes were shot around the Castle of Santa Caterina; the siren sequence was set on Lipari. In Iceland, during the white nights, Hades was filmed. On a Moroccan beach, where Ulysses meets Calypso, the wind whipped sand into the actors\u2019 faces.<\/p>\n The stated goal is physicality. No green screen\u2014or almost none. The Greeks\u2019 ship was a real ship that sailed across the Mediterranean. The Cyclops is not a digital monster but a combination of animatronics, puppets, and computer graphics, brought to life by the performance of Bill Irwin, the same actor who gave voice and form to the robot in Interstellar<\/em>. To design him, Nolan and production designer Ruth De Jong drew inspiration from Francisco Goya\u2019s Saturn Devouring His Sons<\/em>.<\/p>\n Then there\u2019s the IMAX issue. The Odyssey<\/em> is the first feature film shot entirely with IMAX cameras on 70mm film. The format delivers extremely high image quality but also presents significant challenges: the camera is noisy (Damon compared it to acting with a blender running right next to his face), it weighs so much that a helicopter was needed to hoist it up rocky slopes, and it\u2019s so bulky that the actors couldn\u2019t see each other\u2019s faces during filming. They solved this with a system of mirrors.<\/p>\n Matt Damon as Ulysses in *The Odyssey*.<\/em><\/p>\n <\/span>Melinda Sue Gordon\/Universal Pictures<\/span><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n The Music<\/strong><\/p>\n The soundtrack is by Ludwig G\u00f6ransson, a three-time Oscar winner who previously collaborated with Nolan on Tenet<\/em> and Oppenheimer<\/em>. At Nolan’s request, he didn’t use an orchestra to score the film. Instead, G\u00f6ransson rented thirty-five bronze gongs of various sizes, recorded them, and combined them with synthesizers. The film’s soundscape also features a lyre nearly as tall as a man: Nolan wanted the sound of the lyre to match that of Odysseus\u2019s bow.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n