“Ain’t no mountain high enough, ain’t no valley low enough…” Unless you’re Christopher Nolan, who evidently took that lyric as a dare. In his forthcoming adaptation of The Odyssey, he’s turned Homer’s ten-year death march into a location scout’s fever dream; dragging cast and crew through unfilmed European crevices, up castles that sneer at gravity, and into caves so ancient they make Wi-Fi weep.

And in this beautifully deranged cinematic boot camp? Matt Damon and Tom Holland: two men at polar ends of the action spectrum. The former, channeling Odysseus with surgical stoicism; Holland, apparently, some kind of bipedal kinetic phenomenon. Stuntman James Newman recently offered us a peek behind the curtain, and now we’re dissecting every delicious, dusty detail.

The Odyssey: How Matt Damon became Odysseus the efficient Matt Damon in a still from Interstellar | Credits: Paramount Picture

Stunt performer...