The Odyssey worldwide box office: $264 million start is Christopher Nolan's best ever; beat Oppenheimer, The Dark Knight

The Odyssey, Christopher Nolan's latest film, has opened to a staggering $264 million worldwide in its first weekend, including $124 million in North America.

Updated on: Jul 20, 2026, 07:52:15 IST

By Abhimanyu Mathur

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Director Christopher Nolan's adaptation of Homer's Odyssey has had a truly epic debut at the box office. The Matt Damon-starrer The Odyssey has debuted globally with $264.1 million in ticket sales on its opening weekend, the best opening for the filmmaker ever.

The Odyssey: Matt Damon plays the titular character in the film.

The Odyssey worldwide box office

Universal Pictures, the studio behind The Odyssey, said on Sunday that the film had grossed $264.1 million globally in its first three days, including $124.5 million in the U.S. and Canada. The last time a film directed by Nolan touched these heights at the box office was in 2012, when The Dark Knight Rises - the final part of his Batman trilogy - opened at $249 million. In the North American market, The Odyssey ranks third on Nolan's list of highest openings, behind The Dark Knight Rises and The Dark Knight. But after factoring in international gross, the mythological epic reigns supreme, allowing the filmmaker to scale new heights. However, the two Batman films do beat The Odyssey when adjusted for inflation.

The two Dark Knight films are the highest-grossing ventures of Nolan's storied career, with both grossing over $1 billion. The Odyssey, with a strong word of mouth, looks set to target that mark as well. Nolan's previous film - Oppenheimer - stopped just short of it with a worldwide gross of $915 million in 2023.

Craze for The Odyssey

The film, based on the ancient Greek poem by Homer, stars Matt Damon as the Greek hero Odysseus and follows his perilous journey home after fighting the Trojan War. The Odyssey cost $250 million to make. It received an A CinemaScore from filmgoers who attended opening-night screenings, and an audience rating of 97% on Rotten Tomatoes.

Half the movie-goers elected to see The Odyssey in an enhanced format in the U.S. and Canada, including 23% at IMAX, according to Universal.

Fans began snapping up tickets for The Odyssey a year ago when seats at select IMAX theatres went on sale. IMAX said demand for tickets was so high that more than 50 theatres across North America added show times between midnight and 7 a.m.

IMAX CEO Richard Gelfond said the company had booked $50 million in advance ticket sales, its strongest presales ever.

All about The Odyssey

Apart from Matt Damon, The Odyssey also stars Anne Hathaway, Tom Holland, Robert Pattinson, Zendaya, Charlize Theron, and Lupita N'yongo in pivotal roles.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Abhimanyu Mathur
Abhimanyu Mathur is Deputy Editor, Entertainment at Hindustan Times. With almost 15 years of experience in writing about everything from films and TV shows to cricket matches and elections, he inhales and exhales pop culture and news. Currently, he watches movies and TV shows and talks to celebrities for a living, while occasionally writing about them as well. A journalism graduate of Delhi College of Arts and Commerce, Delhi University, Abhimanyu began his career with Hindustan Times at the age of 20, swapping classrooms for newsrooms at an early age. He began his journey in the early days of digital journalism, later switching to the madness of print journalism. Work has led him to far off places like Japan and Jordan, as well as to the interiors of Haryana and the Indo-Pak border. He dabbled in city reporting in places like Meerut, Gurgaon, and Delhi, covered the Olympics and Cricket World Cups, before finding his calling in entertainment and lifestyle during the pandemic. A Rotten Tomatoes Certified Film Critic, he is equally at home covering stories on ground as he is interviewing celebrities and studios, and sometimes prefers to shepherd teams in delivering traffic through the day. Even as his role has evolved from reporter to supervisor over the years, his first love remains writing (and of late, talking on camera). With a good understanding of cinema and its trends, and a keen eye for detail, he continues to spark conversations around showbiz for readers around the world.Read More

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