Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey opens with $51 million on day one

Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey opened with $51 million on its first day, after Thursday previews of $17.6 million made it the biggest first-day haul of 2026 at that point. Universal Pictures’ release, starring Matt Damon, Zendaya, Tom Holland and Anne Hathaway, arrived with enough momentum to immediately reset weekend expectations.

Universal released the film on July 17, 2026, and NBCUniversal said Nolan brought Homer’s foundational saga to IMAX screens for the first time. Advance IMAX 70mm tickets sold out about a year ahead in some places, with listings appearing in Texas and Arizona, and one estimate put the run at only 39 IMAX 70mm locations, the widest such rollout in recent history.

Box-office tracking had swung from roughly $90 million to $100 million for the opening weekend before later estimates climbed as high as $117 million to $120 million. The film has been described as a $250 million production, with marketing expected to add about $120 million more, turning the launch into a high-stakes test of whether premium large-format bookings can still anchor a summer release. If the weekend lands at the top of those forecasts, The Odyssey would become the third 2026 film to open above $100 million, after Toy Story 5 and The Super Mario Galaxy Movie.

The numbers arrive in the shadow of Nolan’s Oppenheimer, which finished with $330,078,895 domestically and $646,700,321 internationally, and alongside Denis Villeneuve’s Dune: Part Two, which opened to $82.5 million in the United States and $182.5 million worldwide. Industry commentary has already framed The Odyssey as Nolan’s biggest debut since The Dark Knight Rises, while first reactions have been unusually strong, with Variety describing them as raves and citing praise such as “astonishing,” “flawless filmmaking,” and “breathtaking, bold and perfection.”

The release has also stirred criticism over Nolan’s decision to adapt Homer’s epic and renewed attention from classicists debating Odysseus’ heroism. With one film drawing sellout IMAX bookings, heavy advance sales, and a flood of cultural argument, The Odyssey has become a live measure of whether moviegoing is still driven by a handful of spectacle releases that audiences treat as mandatory or by Nolan’s name alone.