Christopher Nolan has landed the biggest global opening weekend of his career with “The Odyssey,” a nearly three-hour, R-rated retelling of Homer’s ancient epic that pulled in $263.7 million worldwide against a $123.5 million domestic haul, according to studio estimates from Universal Pictures.
The film’s momentum has only strengthened since its debut. It notched Universal’s best Monday of the year at roughly $18 million and followed that with a $20 million Tuesday, putting it on pace to challenge the second-weekend hauls of Nolan’s “Dark Knight” films. No wide release stands between “The Odyssey” and Sony’s “Spider-Man: Brand New Day,” out July 31, an unusual gap that studios left open once the demand for Nolan’s film became apparent.
Roughly half the audience fell between ages 18 and 34, according to PostTrak exit surveys, a striking figure for a film built around a 2,700-year-old Greek poem. Box Office Theory founder Shawn Robbins credits years of online discussion around Nolan’s earlier work, from “Inception” to “The Dark Knight,” for cultivating a generation of viewers who now treat his releases as must-see events. That enthusiasm shows up beyond ticket sales too: the film became the fastest ever to reach a million logged views on Letterboxd, hitting the mark in six days, half the time it took “Barbie.”
IMAX chief executive Richard Gelfond points to the film as validation of the format itself, noting it became the first narrative feature shot entirely on IMAX cameras and that presales for its second weekend rank among the company’s strongest ever. Only 41 theaters worldwide can screen the movie in IMAX 70mm, though Gelfond says the network has grown from 30 locations during “Oppenheimer” and faces real constraints in expanding further, including the difficulty of sourcing large-format projectors.
Critics have responded with similar enthusiasm, giving the film a 94 percent approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, tied for the best of Nolan’s career, alongside an A CinemaScore from opening-weekend audiences. The result arrives after a rough stretch for the industry, with recent underperformers including “Supergirl,” “Minions & Monsters” and the live-action “Moana” all falling short of projections. Cast members including Matt Damon, Zendaya, Anne Hathaway and Tom Holland have drawn their own social media attention, with Holland’s performance as Telemachus offering a rare non-superhero showcase ahead of his return to theaters as Spider-Man later this month.
