The next Christopher Nolan movie is several years away, says director
A heavy price for heavy burdens
Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey had a gangbusters first weekend in cinemas, but the director has suggested he’s going to need a break before tackling his next movie project.
And given how Hollywood works, this means his next movie is likely a healthy handful of years away.
Nolan said we should expect “at least” a gap of three years before his next film arrives, in an interview with Today.
The Odyssey is his largest production budget movie to date, at $250 million without marketing spend, before accounting for inflation. And certainly his most “epic” film so far, and not just because it’s based on an actual epic poem.
He's earned a break, not that we're actually persuaded Nolan will actually take much time off.
“I definitely hit the limits of my own stamina and everybody’s stamina,” Nolan said during the interview, talking about the film's production.
Breaking new ground
The Odyssey is the first movie shot entirely on IMAX cameras, and as usual for Nolan it features loads of practical effects rather than immediately taking CGI or — gasp — AI shortcuts. That included filming an actual recreation “viking” ship, the Draken Harald Hårfagre, out on the water.
To give you some idea of the timeline of a big Nolan film, the Odyssey was officially announced in December 2024, began shooting February 2025, and took roughly three months to film across a handful of countries including the US, Iceland, Scotland, Morocco, Greece (obviously) and Italy.
This one absolutely was not just shot in green-screen-ready studio rooms.
The Odyssey made $264 million over its opening weekend, with no extra preview days. That’s Nolan’s biggest earner to date, at least before adjusting for inflation. The Dark Knight Rises made $249 million over its opening weekend, which is around $360 million in today’s money.
We have no particularly strong leads as to what Nolan will take on next, but recent interviews have at least offered some clues.
In the past, the director has expressed some interest in one day making a horror-adjacent movie, helming an instalment of the James Bond series and even making an adaptation of The Prisoner — the 1960s show in which Patrick McGoohan is stalked by a creepy white balloon.
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