While the film has been praised for its scale and ensemble cast, one of the loudest early endorsements has centered on Matt Damon’s performance as Odysseus, with one Academy member going as far as predicting the actor should finally take home his first Best Actor Oscar.
Matt Damon’s Performance Is Already Inspiring Early Oscar Predictions
The first wave of Academy screenings has put Damon’s performance at the center of the awards conversation. One attendee highlighted two of the movie’s quieter moments rather than its large-scale action. “I became so emotional when he hears the Sirens, and when he pets his beautiful dog,” the Academy member said before making an even bolder prediction: “I think Matt has to win the Oscar. He has to.”
The praise arrives as Damon seeks his first Academy Award for acting. He won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay alongside Ben Affleck for “Good Will Hunting” in 1998 and previously earned nominations for “Good Will Hunting,” “Invictus,” and “The Martian.” He also received a Best Picture nomination as a producer of “Manchester by the Sea,” but has yet to claim an acting statuette.
In “The Odyssey,” Damon plays the legendary Greek king Odysseus, whose decade-long journey home after the Trojan War brings him face-to-face with mythological creatures and impossible trials as he struggles to reunite with his wife, Penelope, and their son, Telemachus. Directed by Nolan, the epic features an ensemble cast that includes Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, Lupita Nyong’o, Zendaya, Charlize Theron, Jon Bernthal, and John Leguizamo.