The 2016 fantasy epic "Gods of Egypt," directed by Alex Proyas, presents a lavish and fantastical world of CGI Egypt. However, the film has faced criticism for its historical and mythological inaccuracies, as well as its casting choices.
The Plot: A Loose Interpretation of Egyptian Mythology
The plot of the movie is fairly straightforward. Horus (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau) is in the middle of his coronation ceremony to become king of the gods when suddenly his chaotic uncle Set (Gerard Butler) crashes the party. Set kills Osiris (Bryan Brown), his brother and Horus’s father, and easily defeats the other Egyptian gods. He becomes king, and Horus goes into self-imposed exile. Horus only comes out of this exile when a plucky, wise-cracking thief named Bek (Brenton Thwaites) comes searching for the god in order to find a way to bring his ladylove, Zaya (Courtney Eaton), back from the dead. To retrieve his other eye and reclaim his place as king against all odds Horus teams up with Bek.
Whitewashing and Casting Choices
One of the major criticisms of "Gods of Egypt" is its lack of a diverse cast. Proyas, after apologizing for his whitewashing, has defended his choices in part by saying his film isn't at all meant to be historically accurate. But this is a film that borrows the aspects of a culture it deems exciting while leaving behind the actual humans from whom that culture sprung. The extras in the crowd scenes and those playing servants in the background are more diverse than the main cast - people of color are used as wordless set dressing.
The film leaps right for the opportunity to cast Australian beefcake. Unfortunately, the lack of a diverse cast and Proyas’s casting choices remain a mystery.
Mythological Inaccuracies
Aside from the Egyptian gods turning into giant metal Transformer-esque beings, director Alex Proyas somehow managed to get some of the most basic attributes of the gods correct. While his attributions were competent, Proyas fell back on the typical tropes of Hollywood’s view of ancient Egypt: the exotic, animal-headed gods and the view that ancient Egypt was a mystical, unknown, magical culture. In reality, the gods were much more nuanced than was portrayed in this film, and ancient Egypt was a living, vibrant, human and very much Earthly culture.
Read also: Gods of Egypt: Hathor
The movie combines ancient Egyptian mythology, Marvel’s Thor franchise, the buddy action-adventure genre, the ancient Greek myth of Orpheus and the ancient Greek myth of the riddling Sphinx. Why use one mythological world when you can use at least three and mash them all together?
Horus
In ancient Egyptian mythology, Horus, the son of Osiris and Isis, is a god associated with kingship (specifically, the living king), aspects of the solar cult, the sky, the horizon, the east, the winds and the sunrise. During his eponymous battle with Set, Horus loses one eye, not the two as he does in the movie. In ancient Egyptian mythology, the Eye of Horus, or wadjet/udjet eye, is his left eye, which, in myth, represented the moon. The eye is eventually restored by Hathor, not a plucky thief. This eye is associated with healing as well as protection, strength and perfection.
In the film, Set rips out both of Horus’s eyes, but we’re not really told his reasons except that they are the source of Horus’s divine power, which allows him to turn into a golden, metal flying humanoid-bird figure.
Set
Proyas portrays Set as an evil god; however, in Egyptian mythology, Set is a little bit more complicated. He is the god associated with chaos, storms and bad weather, the desert and foreigners. He is the brother of Osiris, Isis and Nephthys, who is also Set’s wife, and the uncle to Horus. As a result of his reign as king, he also had a connection to Egyptian kingship. Set is an instigator of change. Additionally, as a god associated with foreigners, he is often associated with the Near Eastern goddesses Astarte and Anat (who are not a set of monster-cobra-riding assassins in mythology as they are portrayed in the film).
Proyas rightly connects Set to the desert, and his use of Astarte and Anat was a subtle (and surprisingly correct) nod to their connection. It was moments like these that were aggravating. Someone appears to have done their homework, yet it wasn’t always consistent throughout the movie, as we have Set turning himself into some sort of Voltron-like being with his stolen items from fellow gods.
Read also: Riddles of the Sphinx
Thoth
Thoth is most famous for his association with knowledge and writing, but perhaps less known for his connection to the moon. He is often depicted as an ibis-headed god, but sometimes he may be depicted as a baboon. Thoth tends to carry around a stylus and papyrus to record events. Movie-Thoth was a relief with his sassy, dead-panned lines and academic outlook on life, but why was he so stiff? He seemed so uncomfortable with his lines that he made me squirm in my seat. Is that how Proyas views intelligent, academic-like individuals? As socially awkward, pedantic, pompous people who walk around inexplicably (and uncomfortably) holding their elbows behind their backs?
Ra
The ship of Ra is an example of a moment where Proyas captured something deeper in ancient Egyptian mythology. It demonstrated what could have been for this movie. Proyas’s story of Ra wasn’t perfect, but I was rather impressed by Geoffrey Rush’s scenes. And, to be honest, they were probably the most enjoyable of the non-action scenes.
The Egyptian myths explain the sun’s movement in many ways. Sometimes the sun is the scarab beetle god Khepre, pushing the solar disk across the sky like a giant dung ball; other times, it is Ra sailing across the sky in his solar barque. At night, Ra has to sail through the netherworld and fight off demons, monsters and the serpent Apophis, who symbolizes evil and chaos. Movie-Ra sails across the sky in a rather fabulous alien spacecraft that tows the sun, which trails behind it on a flimsy rope (Egyptology aside, wouldn’t that cause some serious drag on the solar ship?). In his universe, Ra (and his trailing sun) sailed over the edge of the world and under it, and while it was rather clumsily done visually, I appreciated the attempt. In the movie, Ra has to battle the demon alone.
The movie sets were overblown and bombastic and looked like the love child of Asgard and the Las Vegas Luxor Hotel and Casino. While lovely to look at, it was not in any way accurate. In some aspects, Proyas’s vision worked only because it echoed the Egyptian revival style paintings by 18th-, 19th- and early 20th-century painters and opera set designers. Rather like those Egyptian revival artists, Proyas simply translated ancient Egyptian architecture into modern forms. By doing so, he successfully perpetuates the Hollywood anachronistic view of ancient Egyptian architecture and motifs. He rather lazily used the same kingly titles and names over and over again as pure decoration without seeming to understand their meaning, such as Tutankhamun’s throne name, Nebkheperure, on Ra’s spaceship.
Ironically, Osiris’s name is literally written all over Set’s obelisk.
Read also: Is Gods of Egypt Suitable?
Overall Impression
The movie ultimately felt like a surreal ancient astronaut idea gone wrong. I can’t believe the level of hate by movie-goers and critics have for Gods of Egypt is still growing. Not since Fantastic Four has there been such a vile response to a product.
The movie stumbles with its ideas of deciding if it is supposed to take ideas from Egyptian mythology or be an independent fantasy product. The film makes itself clear that it’s using established ideas from the myths. However, a few details lost is the fact Osiris does not have a penis and Isis lived to a ripe old age. This film decides to have her commit suicide after Seth’s usurping of the throne.
I liked the design of the Solar Barque that Ra lived on, but just where Gods of Egypt sits is with clichéd ideas than to follow the Book of the Dead. Instead of following the guidelines established in the Stargate movie (I feel that movie and the sequel books by Bill McCay set the bar), it went Prince of Persia with rushed effects work ala The Mummy Returns.
Unfortunately, the lack of a diverse cast and Proyas’s casting choices remain a mystery.
Gods of Egypt EXPOSED: How Accurate is the Movie to Mythology? | Egyptian Mythology Explained
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