Exploring the Odyssey: The Boy and the Heron

Name: Exploring the Odyssey: The Boy and the Heron
Start: 2025-02-17T18:00:00-05:00
Location: Brattle Theatre

Schedule

Mon, 17 Feb, 2025 at 06:00 pm

UTC-05:00

Location

Brattle Theatre | Cambridge, MA

Presented in association with the American Repertory Theater
In celebration of the new production of The Odyssey which is soon to open at the Loeb Drama Center (Feb 9–Mar 16), we are excited to team up with our friends from the American Repertory Theater for film screenings that explore Homer’s epic (and epically influential) tale. Approaching the text from a contemporary point of view while still involving mythically inspired staging, the acclaimed writer and adaptor Kate Hamill (Sense & Sensibility) eschews some of the traditional heroics of Odysseus’s return asking if those changed by the ‘hero’s journey’ can ever really go back home. Learn more: https://americanrepertorytheater.org/shows-events/the-odyssey/

Each screening will be accompanied by a special introduction from A.R.T. staff.
THE BOY AND THE HERON • While the Second World War rages, the teenage Mahito, haunted by his mother’s tragic death, is relocated from Tokyo to the serene rural home of his new stepmother Natsuko, a woman who bears a striking resemblance to the boy’s mother. As he tries to adjust, this strange new world grows even stranger following the appearance of a persistent gray heron, who perplexes and bedevils Mahito, dubbing him the “long-awaited one.” (2023 • dir Hayao Miyazaki • 124 min • DCP)
THE RETURN • After twenty years away, Odysseus washes up on the shores of Ithaca, haggard and unrecognizable. The king has finally returned home, but much has changed in his kingdom since he left to fight in the Trojan war. (2024 • dir Uberto Pasolini w/Ralph Fiennes, Juliette Binoche, Charlie Plummer, Marwan Kenzari • 116 min • DCP)