Nolan also said that the debate proved people look at the past “in weird ways”.

“There’s a lot of cultural prejudice,” the Oscar winner suggested. “There’s a lot of sort of elevating it, because it’s old, you know, whatever it is.”

He added that “when you go to the poem” on which his latest big-screen offering is based, “what you find is something that’s really earthy and grounded and accessible”, which he tried to replicate by using modern-day phrasing in the dialogue.

The Oppenheimer director made a similar point during a recent interview with the LA Times to promote his latest work.

“It might bite me on the ass, but I wanted an earthy narrative,” he claimed. “To me it was a no-brainer.”

Nolan’s new movie boasts an all-star cast that includes everyone from Oscar winners Matt Damon, Anne Hathaway Lupita Nyong’o and Charlize Theron to Zendaya, Himesh Patel and Elliot Page.

Early reactions to the film have been almost unanimously positive, with one performance in particular being singled out for praise on social media by those who have been able to watch the film at screenings.

The Odyssey hits cinemas on Friday 17 July.