Christopher Nolan is no stranger to tackling all things epic, and now he’s taken on the epic of all epics: Homer’s The Odyssey, the 3,000‑year‑old piece of beloved literature about a chap trying to find his way home. If any director was going to pull this off, it was Nolan.

We all know the story (or at least, we all pretend we do), so don’t expect a full synopsis. Odysseus (Matt Damon, who, dare I say, looks great at 55 – sorry, not sorry) and his men lose their way on their return to Ithaca following years at war in Troy, and must overcome a cornucopia of mythical encounters to get home (if only he’d tried clicking his heels three times).

The cast is stacked with talent, though many of the big names – Charlize Theron, Lupita Nyong’o and Zendaya – are given only a few minutes of screen time each. Standouts include Matt Damon, who gives it his all as Odysseus – heroic, brave, weary and burdened; John Leguizamo, something of the heart of the story as the blind Eumaeus; Samantha Morton, spine‑chillingly good as the witch Circe; and Robert Pattinson, whose snivelling, cowardly turn as Antinous is one of his best showings.

Not every casting is a hit. Tom Holland doesn’t have the gravitas to be anything other than “Tom Holland”, making his turn as Odysseus’ son Telemachus a rather bland offering. Anne Hathaway does a perfectly formidable job as Penelope, Odysseus’ wife, until she is required to depict any emotion other than stoicism, at which point her words seem to engage in a battle with her expressions.

Where the movie falls down (slightly) is in the pacing. Whilst nobody could expect every detail to make it to the silver screen, the episodic nature of the source material results in set‑piece after set‑piece, interspersed with brief check‑ins at Ithaca that remind us Penelope is still waiting for Odysseus’ return and Antinous is still a despicable weasel. A fair bit of the dialogue loses some of that classical je ne sais quoi — Tom Holland referring to Odysseus and Penelope as “mom and dad” is certainly a choice, and poor Robert Pattinson yelling “Swords! Shields! Spears!” deserves to become a meme.

But when things work, they work. The overriding themes of these set pieces are tension and grotesqueness. The design of the infamous Cyclops is horrifically simple yet still enough to induce nightmares, and the scene where Odysseus and his crew are trapped in the Cyclops’ cave is edge‑of‑your‑seat tense. The scenes on Circe’s island are the closest Nolan comes to straight‑up horror and offer yet another take on body horror – something we’ve seen so much of in film of late. Through some great camerawork, we feel the suffocating desperation of the soldiers inside the Trojan Horse, so much so that by the time the sacking of Troy takes place, we’re glad for some traditional hacking and stabbing to ease the tension.

Ironically, all this gruesomeness is absolutely stunning to look at. Nolan blends multiple techniques — puppetry, stunt work and (gasp!) CGI — to create a world where divine fantasy is grounded in realism (with the jarring exception of the army of Laestrygonians, who look like they’ve just waltzed out of a Marvel movie). Complementing the visuals is Ludwig Göransson’s intense score and some of the most ear‑splitting sound design in film (in an absolutely good way!)

There’s no doubt that despite a few imperfections, The Odyssey will down as a true work of art. With Nolan ticking this epic off his to‑do list, the only question left is, markedly apropos: “where to next?”

The Odyssey is in cinemas now.