Despite a duration of almost three hours, this mythological fresco with a five-star cast is well ahead of the little Polynesian Vaianna and the Minions.
For its first weekend in theaters, Christopher Nolan’s epic, The Odyssey topped the North American box office, with $124.5 million in revenue, according to industry estimates published Sunday July 19. According to the American site Variety, specialists were instead counting on a range from 85 to 105 million dollars.
The estimates are based on data recorded in 3,919 theaters and allow the film to rise to third place among the best releases of the year, behind Toy Story 5 (159 million dollars) and Super Mario Galaxy The Movie (131 million), again according to the Variety website.
250 million dollars budget
The nearly three-hour fresco, adapted from Homer’s 3,000-year-old poem, was filmed in six countries (including Greece, Morocco and Italy), sometimes on the open sea, and with iMax cameras, a film format offering a unique resolution but technically very restrictive. This excellent start bodes well knowing that the budget of the film is colossal, estimated at 250 million dollars. Released in theaters on July 15, 2026, The Odyssey is undoubtedly the director’s most ambitious film to date, faithfully adapted from this founding work of Western literature.
Carried by a prestigious cast, including Matt Damon in the role of Ulysses and Anne Hathaway in that of PenelopeThe Odyssey can sail serenely on the waves. “Nolan is the only current filmmaker capable of taking on such an ancient story, bringing together such a vast and accomplished cast and making it a cultural event.”says David Gross of Franchise Entertainment Research. The Odyssey becomes the biggest start for a Nolan feature film, ahead of The Dark Knight Rises in 2012 and Oppenheimer in 2023.
Shipwreck for Vaianna
Far behind comes Vaiana, the legend of the end of the worldthe live-action remake of the 2016 animated film, starring Dwayne Johnson, released July 8. It only earned $19 million, which looks like a disaster for Disney. The story is that of a young Polynesian girl embarked on an adventure across the ocean, accompanied by the demigod Maui, to save her people from an evil that is consuming their atoll.
Minions and monsters takes third place in the ranking with 14.8 million dollars in revenue while Toy Story 5 ranks fourth with $13 million collected. The horror movie Evil Dead Burn by Warner Bros closes this top 5 at the North American box office with 5 million receipts.
The horror movie Obsession arrives completely unexpectedly in eighth place in the ranking. No stars on display, less than a million dollars in budget and already more than 430 million dollars in revenue. This thriller released at the beginning of May is panicking the counters and could become the most profitable film in history, driven by word of mouth and Generation Z’s appetite for horror films.
Its young director, American YouTuber Curry Barker, 26, is the new Hollywood sensation. For his first film, he was included in the top 10 of the biggest global hits of 2026, alongside notably Backrooms signed by another 20-year-old YouTuber, Kane Parsons, whose film grossed $360 million for a budget of around 10 million.
Source: Franceinfo
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