The video game industry's finest film critic has seen Christopher Nolan's latest epic, and he is a fan. I'm talking about the one and only Metal Gear mastermind himself, Hideo Kojima, who's provided his thoughts on The Odyssey on Twitter.
"Rather than simply watching the screen, I felt as though I was there the entire time," he says of his viewing experience. "It was more than watching it, I witnessed it."
Like any good Letterboxd devotee, he caught the blockbuster in 70mm IMAX. I, sadly, had to settle for regular projection due to the dearth of IMAX options in Scotland. Forgive me, Kojima. Anyway, he mentions that it reminded him of the Cinerama screenings when he was a child, and how that contrast to his CRT television at home blew his mind.
"I already knew the story well, having grown up watching the 1954 Kirk Douglas version and several black-and-white adaptations, but this was an entirely different experience," he writes. "For me, it was an Odyssey unlike anything I had ever experienced."
He gives a shout out to the cinematography of Nolan and his longtime collaborator, Hoyte van Hoytema, in how it makes the production feel remarkably intimate – along with the use Nolan's "meticulous interwoven timelines," a staple of the director's films like Inception and Oppenheimer, too.
"Together, these elements elevate one of the world's best-known classical epics into an intimate, deep human drama," Kojima says. "It was magnificent."
I think he liked it. The Odyssey has proven to be another hit for Nolan, scoring him his biggest opening weekend ever. Kojima saw it at the David Keighley theatre at IMAX's base in Los Angeles, an invite-only cinema. Alas, Japanese fans will have to settle for public viewings when it opens there in September.
