‘The Odyssey’ Crosses $1B, Topping Nolan’s Batman Films

Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey has sailed past $1 billion at the global box office in just three weeks. It has become the director’s highest-grossing film ever and surpassed the long-standing record of The Dark Knight Rises ($1.085 billion).

The Homeric epic, starring Matt Damon, Tom Holland, and Anne Hathaway, marks Nolan’s triumphant return to the billion-dollar club after a 14-year gap. His last film to cross that threshold was 2012’s The Dark Knight Rises.

The Odyssey has grossed approximately $429.7 million domestically and $570.3 million internationally, per Deadline. It has also grossed $429.65 million domestic and $578.8 million international for a total of $1.008 billion, per Variety.

IMAX has contributed a massive $257 million in ticket sales and is on track to become the company’s highest-grossing release ever by the end of the weekend.

The Odyssey Surpasses the Bat-Films

The Odyssey is Nolan’s third film to reach $1 billion, joining The Dark Knight (2008) and The Dark Knight Rises (2012). That it achieved the milestone with an adult-skewing drama — nearly three hours long and adapted from a 3,000-year-old poem — makes the feat all the more striking.

The film has yet to open in China (Aug. 14) or Japan (Sept. 11), two of the world’s largest moviegoing markets. This suggests its box office run still has significant runway.

“Solidifying Nolan as the most bankable filmmaker of his generation.”

— Variety editorial staff

The film’s domestic performance has been remarkably resilient. On its fourth Friday in theaters, The Odyssey is estimated to earn between $25 million and $35 million in North America this weekend. This would push its domestic total past $450 million.

That would mark another weekend drop of less than 50%, even after losing its IMAX exclusivity to Sony/Marvel’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day.

2026’s Billion-Dollar Boom

The Odyssey is the fifth film of 2026 to cross $1 billion. It follows Spider-Man: Brand New Day (currently the year’s highest-grossing pic at more than $1.1 billion), Toy Story 5, Michael, and The Super Mario Galaxy Movie.

Universal Pictures — The Odyssey’s distributor — has become the first studio to reach $4 billion globally in 2026, with The Odyssey as a key title.

Combined, Brand New Day and The Odyssey account for $2.1 billion at the global box office. Hollywood is banking on the two blockbusters to push domestic ticket sales above $4 billion for only the second time since COVID.

The first time the North American box office hit that mark was in 2023, when Nolan’s prior film, the Oscar-winning Oppenheimer ($975 million), and Greta Gerwig’s Barbie galvanized audiences.

At the midway point, 2026 has already produced the most billion-dollar blockbusters since the pandemic. A record nine movies crossed the milestone in 2019, but no year since had more than three until now.

Looking ahead, The Odyssey sets its sights on the all-time box office record for an R-rated film. This record is currently held by 2024’s Deadpool & Wolverine with $1.33 billion.

If it passes $1.36 billion, it will top The Super Mario Galaxy Movie to become Universal’s third highest-grossing film before inflation adjustment.

China is rolling out the red-carpet treatment for the film, with nearly 800 IMAX screens and thousands of standard auditoriums set for Aug. 14. With glowing word-of-mouth and outsized interest in premium large formats, The Odyssey is poised to remain a big-screen draw through the summer and into the fall.

Sources

• Deadline
• Variety