Sightlines · reception
How Ulysses' Gaze was received
1995 · Theo Angelopoulos · Ulysses' Gaze on Sightlines
The arc
At Cannes 1995 it took the Grand Prix but famously lost the Palme d'Or to Kusturica's Underground — and Angelopoulos made his displeasure plain from the podium — while critics split between 'masterpiece' and 'monument to tedium.' Three decades on it's settled in as a cornerstone of 1990s art cinema and the slow-cinema canon.
What’s debated
The perennial fight: transcendent epic or three punishing hours of fog and long takes — with a side debate over whether Harvey Keitel is soulful or stranded in it.
Its footprint
The dismantled Lenin statue drifting down the Danube on a barge is one of the decade's most referenced images, shorthand for the end of the communist century — and Eleni Karaindrou's mournful score has a devoted life of its own.
Where it stands
A badge-of-honor watch for slow-cinema devotees and a standard gateway into Angelopoulos, more revered than rewatched.
Did you know? Gian Maria Volonté died of a heart attack during the shoot in Greece and was replaced by Erland Josephson; the finished film is dedicated to Volonté's memory.