‘The Odyssey’ Is Inspiring Unprecedented Levels of Cope

《奥德赛》引发了前所未有的“应对机制”

For months, Elon Musk and the right-wing cranks he caters to on X have whipped themselves into a raging froth over the supposed desecration of an ancient Greek poem by one of the most successful movie directors alive. 几个月来，埃隆·马斯克（Elon Musk）及其在 X 平台上迎合的右翼怪人们，针对一位当今最成功的电影导演对古希腊史诗的所谓“亵渎”，一直处于一种歇斯底里的狂热状态。

Now that their manufactured backlash has bombed, they’re searching for ways to cope with the reality that they are increasingly divorced from popular opinion. 如今，随着他们人为制造的抵制浪潮彻底失败，他们正试图寻找各种方式来应对一个现实：他们与大众舆论的脱节正日益加深。

Christopher Nolan’s artistic crimes in bringing The Odyssey to the screen, according to Musk and others in a furor, were instances of what they called “historical inaccuracy” in a lavish fantasy teeming with monsters, witches, and undead spirits—mainly the casting of Lupita Nyong’o, who is Black, as Helen of Troy, and Elliot Page, who is trans, as Sinon. 在马斯克和其他愤怒者眼中，克里斯托弗·诺兰（Christopher Nolan）将《奥德赛》搬上银幕的“艺术罪行”，在于这部充斥着怪物、女巫和亡灵的奢华奇幻片中存在所谓的“历史不准确”——主要是指由黑人演员露皮塔·尼永奥（Lupita Nyong’o）饰演特洛伊的海伦，以及由跨性别演员艾略特·佩吉（Elliot Page）饰演西农。

The grand total of approximately 10 minutes of screen time between these actors in a three-hour saga, combined with the general hysteria over “wokeness” in Hollywood, a rejection of Americanized dialog, and lingering misogyny regarding scholar Emily Wilson’s 2017 translation of Homer’s epic (the first by a woman), resulted in countless teeth-gnashing posts and calls for a boycott that never materialized. 这两位演员在长达三小时的史诗巨作中总共只有约 10 分钟的戏份，再加上好莱坞对“觉醒文化”（wokeness）的普遍歇斯底里、对美式对白的排斥，以及对学者艾米莉·威尔逊（Emily Wilson）2017 年翻译的荷马史诗（首个女性译本）挥之不去的厌女情绪，最终导致了无数咬牙切齿的帖子和从未真正实现的抵制呼声。

Instead, the mythic drama hauled in a staggering $264 million as it opened this past weekend, sailing toward continued box office dominance and, in all likelihood, a slew of awards. A few conservative commentators, including Ben Shapiro—no fan of DEI or “woke” values—acknowledged it as a landmark achievement. But while some who had predicted its doom knew enough to move on from this battle to other fronts in the culture war, many sank deeper into denial. 相反，这部神话剧在上周末上映时狂揽了惊人的 2.64 亿美元票房，正向着持续的票房统治地位迈进，并极有可能横扫各大奖项。包括本·夏皮罗（Ben Shapiro）在内的一些保守派评论员——他绝非 DEI 或“觉醒”价值观的拥趸——也承认这是一项里程碑式的成就。然而，尽管一些曾预言其失败的人懂得从这场战斗转向文化战争的其他阵地，但更多人却陷入了更深的自我欺骗之中。

“BREAKING,” blared one anonymous X account on Monday. “The Odyssey is FAKING ticket sales by buying up theaters/seats (Fraud) to make the movie look like a success (already $400 million in the hole) moviegoers are reporting having to take terrible seats (because full) but when they show up the theaters are mostly empty.” The post included screenshots of unverifiable anecdotes from Reddit about quiet cinemas and no-show ticket holders. “突发新闻，”周一，一个匿名 X 账号大肆宣扬道，“《奥德赛》通过买断影院/座位（欺诈）来伪造票房，让电影看起来很成功（实际上已经亏损 4 亿美元）。观众反映不得不买到很差的座位（因为座位已满），但当他们到达现场时，影院里却空空如也。”该帖子还附上了来自 Reddit 的截图，内容是一些无法核实的轶事，声称影院冷清且购票者并未到场。

What Universal Pictures, the studio behind the film, would stand to gain by spending millions beyond a $250 million production budget and $125 million in marketing costs to astroturf a flop was not exactly clear. Then again, these are the same conspiracists who find it suspicious that the critics’ reviews tend to all be published at the same time. 作为该片的制作方，环球影业在 2.5 亿美元制作预算和 1.25 亿美元营销成本之外，再投入数百万美元去为一个失败的作品“刷数据”能得到什么好处，这并不明确。不过话说回来，这些人正是那些认为影评人往往在同一时间发布评论是“可疑行为”的阴谋论者。

Musk, for his part, seemed to be inspired by an X user who posted three minutes of AI-generated scenes in which characters from The Odyssey are all white and speak in British accents. Commenting on the clip, which at best resembles a montage from a hokey 1970s adaptation, the richest man in the world declared: “Before this year ends, Grok Imagine will make a full-length movie of The Odyssey that is historically accurate and true to the art of Homer.” 马斯克本人似乎受到了一位 X 用户的启发，该用户发布了三分钟由 AI 生成的片段，其中《奥德赛》的角色全是白人，并说着英国口音。这位世界首富评论了这段充其量只像 20 世纪 70 年代拙劣改编作品剪辑的视频，并宣称：“在今年结束之前，Grok Imagine 将制作一部历史准确且忠于荷马艺术的《奥德赛》长篇电影。”

Those familiar with Musk know that when he vows to reach a milestone by year’s end, it basically never happens. The promise of a Grok-animated Odyssey, though minor compared to most of his ambitions—he even speculated in 2025 that the xAI model might “discover new technologies” within several months—is sure to fall by the wayside as well. Not only is it a tiresome idea with zero appeal to the mainstream moviegoer (who has or will soon see Nolan’s version), it’s also unoriginal: The AI studio Fountain 0 is planning the online release of an artificially generated feature titled Odyssey: The Fall this summer. 熟悉马斯克的人都知道，当他承诺在年底前实现某个里程碑时，这基本上永远不会发生。Grok 动画版《奥德赛》的承诺，尽管与他大多数雄心勃勃的目标相比只是小巫见大巫——他甚至在 2025 年推测该 xAI 模型可能在几个月内“发现新技术”——但也注定会不了了之。这不仅是一个令人厌倦且对主流观众（他们已经或即将观看诺兰的版本）毫无吸引力的想法，而且也毫无新意：AI 工作室 Fountain 0 正计划在今年夏天在线发布一部名为《奥德赛：陨落》（Odyssey: The Fall）的 AI 生成长片。

Moreover, both ill-conceived projects misunderstand the lesson that the entertainment industry seems to be taking from Nolan’s latest blockbuster. At a moment when executives imagine that AI is the key to cutting costs and turbocharging output, the director has shown once again that the practical craft of filmmaking beats out what he himself has disparaged as “slop.” 此外，这两个构思拙劣的项目都误解了娱乐业似乎从诺兰最新大片中汲取的教训。在公司高管们幻想 AI 是削减成本和加速产出的关键时刻，这位导演再次证明，电影制作的实践工艺胜过了他本人所贬斥的“垃圾内容”。

So, will this aggrieved little cadre of internet reactionaries ever be able to accept that they don’t understand what audiences want? Or that they have deluded themselves, thanks to skewed algorithms and bogus amplification, into thinking they possess an influence they never had? Please. They’re not capable of conceding a loss. And there’s always another outrage down the road. 那么，这群感到委屈的互联网反动派小团体，是否有一天能接受他们并不了解观众想要什么的事实？或者接受他们因为扭曲的算法和虚假的放大效应，而自欺欺人地认为自己拥有从未真正拥有的影响力？别逗了。他们根本没有认输的能力。而且，前方总会有下一个让他们愤怒的借口。