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The Odyssey of a Nation Without Ithaca

2026-08-03 18:56:38Pikëpamje SHKRUAR NGA ALADIN STAFA
Aladdin Staff

We were wrong to think that the culture of cinema attendance had been lost over the years as we "relaxed" in front of Netflix. The last two weeks showed the opposite. Cinemas around the world were "occupied" by fearsome crowds of fans for the two latest American films, "The Odyssey" and "Spider-Man".

The algorithm and social networks also focused significantly on these two cinematic works. Totally different for the era they represent but with the same message; returning home, returning to oneself for a new beginning.

With these cinema productions, the American continent showed at once, for a very short time, that it not only seeks to dominate the globe in politics and the military, but also in sports and art. Art - as a "soft power", without objective damage, except for attracting the masses through "Americanization". This is a method that has its origins in Hollywood.

For more than 5 hours of cinematic production (including both films), the obsession with the big screen demonstrated once again that the influence of another power, a softer one that had not been felt for some time, sealed once and for all, in the subconscious of the peoples the dominant force of America.

To return to The Odyssey, the work of the renowned director Christopher Nolan, a project both beloved and criticized, he showed that he tempted many generations. One staying faithful to the old version because of nostalgia, while the young trust this new version because they see the future reflected there.

One of the most interesting aspects is not the film itself, but the fact that a poem written around eight centuries BC manages to fill theaters and be so relevant even in 2026. It seems that it was not just the product that was sold, but the whole thing as a collective memory. A story that everyone believes they know, even without reading Homer.

A myth, that everyone parallels to some extent with his life full of challenges, successes and losses. This was a high-level marketing, where the sale of an identity became the reason for the birth of a cultural phenomenon beyond cinema.

But Nolan didn't just bring back the Odyssey, he also raised the question of life: what happens to a person or a nation when the war ends but the journey doesn't?!

Albania and present-day Greece are still within the Odyssey. Three thousand years ago there were no borders, but ports, merchants, seas, myths and gods. Today, humans try to debate who owns history, while history itself recycles itself.

The Odyssey was not anyone's property, but a product of a Mediterranean civilization. And this is precisely where our paradox in the Balkans still lies: the battles of the past, sidelining the construction of the future.

Today's Albania is living its Odyssey. Albania, like Odysseus, has experienced many symbolic wars over the years. Starting from joining NATO, negotiations to join the EU, fluctuations in tourism from year to year, the economy with statistics, but the question that arises is: are we getting closer to Ithaca or are we just wandering along its shores to and fro wherever the winds blow us?!

Where everything seemed to end, Odysseus' trickery that led to victory in the war became the cause of a wicked complacency, thus seeking to confront the "Gods" on his way home. Enough to show us that every unjust success has a high price and cannot be enjoyed for long.

The metaphors of the Odyssey, paralleling them with the situation in Albania, are clearer than ever:

Cyclops or Polyphemus, son of Poseidon, god of the sea, paid a heavy price to the king of Ithaca. He who with only one eye did not see reality but simply his version. Albanian politics often behaves like Polyphemus, detached from the masses where each side has a monopoly on its truth. And sometimes great power blinds its foresight.

The sirens, a tempting challenge for the Odyssey and its crew. They are not obligatory, but tempting. Today, the “sirens” could very well be algorithms, propaganda, marketing, as well as 30-second videos on Instagram or TikTok. They do not impose themselves on you, but make you surrender your own freedom to them.

Then Circe, who transformed his companions into animals, as if to show us that insatiability, loss of logic and control deforms the human soul. In life, man must control his power and strength. Extremes in poverty or wealth have consequences; one in the loss of identity and the other in greed and avarice.

There was also Hades, where Odysseus saw what awaited him after death. The afterlife, full of friends and enemies, whose faces appeared before him in the harshest way. Man lives on Earth with the peace that the afterlife will be easier than the sins committed on the other side.

Calypso promised Odysseus immortality, but he chose home. Just as Albanians are offered Europe today, wages, security, and peace. But if we all chose Calypso, who would be left to build Ithaca?!

Penelope...not just a woman who waits, but a country, a people who weave hope by day and seek to escape reality by night.

Albania has been living in transition for more than three decades. As if the war had ended in the early 1990s, the journey continues. Institutions are built, trust is shaken, emigration continues, democracy exists but citizens are skeptical.

Perhaps why “The Odyssey” excites us is not because we love myths, but another image. That in every challenge we encounter, we hope to see that piece of land. And the question is not whether “Ithaca” exists, but whether when we can arrive, will it be the same “Ithaca” we knew?!


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