New Canaan Library's video: New Canaan Library Presents: Homer Hollywood Screening The Ancient Greek Epics

Join us for the live webinar on Tuesday, November 8 at 7 PM EST. How are the ancient Greek epics depicted on the big screen? We welcome Professor Monica S. Cyrino, University of New Mexico, whose illustrated talk will explore how ancient Greek epic narrative themes and characters from Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey are adapted in modern popular entertainment and contemporary film. Professor Cyrino will consider how cinematic interpretations of the Homeric poems have inspired filmmakers to use epic themes and images in several recent films: Wolfgang Petersen’s Troy (2004), Clint Eastwood’s Unforgiven (1992); Ridley Scott’s Blade Runner (1982); Andrei Konchalovsky’s Odyssey miniseries (1997); the Coen brothers’ O Brother, Where Art Thou? (2000); and George Miller’s Mad Max: Fury Road (2015). Professor Cyrino’s talk will investigate the various ways the films “adapt” the epic poems, either by attempting to tell the same story in the same context (Troy, Odyssey) or by using the tropes, plots, and scenes of the epics in a different setting or environment (Blade Runner, Unforgiven, O Brother, Fury Road). This presentation offers a snapshot of how classical reception works: how mythological narratives are widely adapted and appropriated, both in projects that advertise their debt to classical antiquity, and those whose engagement is subterranean or selective, yet still potent. Monica Silveira Cyrino (PhD 1992, Yale University) is Professor of Classics and Chair of the Department of Languages, Cultures, and Literatures at the University of New Mexico, USA. Her academic research centers on the reception of the ancient world on screen, and the erotic in ancient Greek poetry. Her book Big Screen Rome (Blackwell, 2005) is a pioneering survey of the most popular and influential films that reconstruct the image of ancient Rome. Her most recent book is Screening Love and War in TROY: FALL OF A CITY (Bloomsbury, 2022). She is the editor of two volumes on the series: ROME, Season One: History Makes Television (Blackwell, 2008), and ROME, Season Two: Trial and Triumph. (Edinburgh UP, 2015). In addition to numerous other books and over fifty published articles and book chapters, Ms. Cyrino is the recipient of several university and academic awards.