“The Odyssey”: How Christopher Nolan Turned a 3,000-Year-Old Epic Poem Into a Record-Breaking Blockbuster
It’s good to be the king.
Christopher Nolan’s epic adaptation of Homer’s The Odyssey has once again proven the writer/director’s pull on audiences, pulling in a king’s ransom in its opening weekend at the box office. The Odyssey sailed into 3,919 domestic theaters and pulled in an astonishing $124.5 million, smashing expectations as easily as the cyclops Polyphemus smashed Odysseus’s men.
This marks Nolan’s biggest debut since his 2012 trilogy capper, The Dark Knight Rises, pulled in $160 million. It’s the third-largest opening this year, following Toy Story 5‘s $159 million haul and The Super Mario Galaxy Movie‘s $131 million. What makes this feat all the more impressive is that The Odyssey is not a zippy animated movie built on the kind of existing IP that usually brings in huge audiences—it is, in fact, based on a 3,000-year-old epic poem that people have more of a passing knowledge of than vivid childhood memories of seeing a previous iteration or playing one in a video game. The fact that Nolan’s epic made that big of a splash while being rated R, another factor that can usually dampen ticket sales, proves how much his kind of ambitious, muscular, craft-forward filmmaking hits the mark with audiences.
The total haul is even more impressive—The Odyssey cruised to $139.6 million at the international box office across 73 markets, for a phenomenal worldwide total of $264.1 million. This marks Nolan’s largest global opening ever, topping The Dark Knight Rises ($249 million), his 2009 hit The Dark Knight ($198 million), and Oppenheimer ($180 million).
Nolan and his cast and crew went to extreme lengths to create something truly epic, becoming the first filmmakers to shoot an entire feature with IMAX cameras. They filmed aboard an actual ship in the Mediterranean, braved the North Sea off Scotland’s coast and the frigid waters of Iceland, and devised all manner of ingenious fixes and workarounds to capture The Odyssey on the grandest scale possible. That commitment to creating something worthy of Homer’s deathless adventure story became a major draw for audiences, who began snapping up premium-format tickets a full year before the film’s release.
The Odyssey boasts a stellar, starry cast, including Matt Damon as Odysseus, Anne Hathaway as his wife, Penelope, Tom Holland as their son, Telemachus, Zendaya as the goddess Athena, Charlize Theron as the nymph-goddess Calypso, John Leguizamo as Eumeaus, Robert Pattinson as the villainous suitor, Antinous, Lupita Nyong’o as both Helen of Troy and her sister, Clytemnestra, Himesh Patel as Eurylochus, Benny Safdie as Agamemnon, and Samantha Morton in a standout performance as the witch Circe.
The Odyssey has also been a hit with critics and audiences, getting an A on CinemaScore exit polls and 95% fresh from critics on Rotten Tomatoes.
For more on The Odyssey, set sail with these stories:
Tom Cruise Hails Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey: “I Can’t Wait to See It Again”
Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey” Finds the Monster Within Its Hero
The Mythic Journeys Fans Are Undertaking to see Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey” in IMAX
Featured image: Director Christopher Nolan on the set of his film THE ODYSSEY, written, produced, and directed by Christopher Nolan.
