How do you follow up a massive success such as “Oppenheimer”?
In director Christopher Nolan’s case, it’s to go bigger and bolder than ever before by adapting one of the world’s oldest stories. “The Odyssey” is based on Homer’s epic poem of the Greek king of Ithaca undergoing a long and perilous journey home after the Trojan War.
It’s an incredibly ambitious project: among the most expensive in Nolan’s career and the first film to be shot entirely with IMAX 70mm cameras. Because of that, tickets are hard to come by if you want to see it in the format Nolan prefers.
However, that’s not stopping you from having a Christopher Nolan movie marathon at home while you patiently wait to see “The Odyssey” in 70mm IMAX. By charting his entire career, you’ll likely appreciate “The Odyssey” even more, as it builds on the themes that Nolan has spent his entire career exploring.
Nolan has made 13 narrative feature films in almost 30 years and 12 of them are available to stream easily right now.
Starring: Jeremy Theobald, Alex Haw, Lucy Russell, John Nolan
“Following” is Nolan’s feature film debut and his only film currently in the Criterion Collection. Using a non-linear narrative (which comes to be one of Nolan’s signatures), it tells the story of a young man who follows strangers around the streets of London and is drawn into a criminal underworld when he fails to keep his distance.
Starring: Guy Pearce, Carrie-Anne Moss, Joe Pantoliano
In “Memento,” Pearce plays Leonard Shelby, a man who has anterograde amnesia and uses an elaborate system of photographs, handwritten notes, and tattoos sprawled across his body in an attempt to uncover the perpetrator who killed his wife and caused him to sustain the condition.
Presented in a non-linear format, one timeline goes chronologically in black and white, while the other, in color, is told in reverse to mimic the mental state of Shelby for audiences. The film marked Nolan’s first Academy Award nomination for writing the screenplay with his brother and frequent collaborator Jonathan.
Starring: Al Pacino, Robin Williams, Hilary Swank, Maura Tierney, Martin Donovan, Nicky Katt, Paul Dooley
Nolan’s third feature is the only one in his filmography that he isn’t credited for writing. “Insomnia” is an English-language remake of the 1997 Norwegian film of the same name that follows two Los Angeles homicide detectives investigating a murder in Nightmute, Alaska. After the killer witnesses an accidental shooting committed by one of the detectives, they create a plan to mutually avoid prosecution.
Starring: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Liam Neeson, Katie Holmes, Gary Oldman, Cillian Murphy, Tom Wilkinson, Rutger Hauer, Ken Watanabe, Morgan Freeman
Nolan followed “Insomnia” with the first film in his “Dark Knight” trilogy. The reboot follows Bruce Wayne (Bale) from the death of his parents to his journey to become Batman. It also chronicles the fight to stop Ra’s al Ghul (Neeson) and the Scarecrow (Murphy) from plunging Gotham City into chaos.
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Scarlett Johansson, Rebecca Hall, Andy Serkis, David Bowie
Nolan immediately collaborated with Bale and Caine again in “The Prestige,” which follows the feud between rival magicians after one of them performs the ultimate magic trick – teleportation. His rival tries desperately to uncover the secret of his routine, experimenting with dangerous new science as his quest takes him to the brink of insanity.
Starring: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Heath Ledger, Gary Oldman, Aaron Eckhart, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Morgan Freeman
“The Dark Knight” is often referred to as one of the best superhero movies ever made in the genre, and certainly represents a high point in this specific trilogy. It holds a lot of “firsts” for both the superhero genre and Nolan’s career: it is the first major motion picture to be filmed with high-resolution IMAX cameras, the first comic-book film to receive major acting awards and the first Nolan film to receive an acting nomination at the Oscars.
Of course, it introduces Heath Ledger’s legendary portrayal of the Joker, for which he won an Oscar, BAFTA and Golden Globe posthumously.
Want to own “The Dark Knight” physically? It was released on 4K UHD.
Starring: Leonardo DiCaprio, Ken Watanabe, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Marion Cotillard, Elliot Page, Tom Hardy, Cillian Murphy, Tom Berenger, Michael Caine
“Inception” is the first Nolan film to receive a Best Picture nomination at the Oscars. The sci-fi action flick is often regarded as one of the best films of the 2010s and follows Dom Cobb (DiCaprio), a professional thief who steals information by infiltrating the dreams of his targets. Cobb is offered a chance to have his criminal history erased as payment for the implantation of another person’s idea into a target’s subconscious and assembles an elite team to do so.
Starring: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Anne Hathaway, Tom Hardy, Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Morgan Freeman
“The Dark Knight” trilogy wrapped up in 2012 with “The Dark Knight Rises.” Set eight years after “The Dark Knight,” Bruce Wayne comes out of retirement and is forced to pick up the Batman mantle again as Gotham City is threatened by another larger-than-life villain, Bane (Hardy). Sitting at over $1 billion at the box office, it remains Nolan’s highest-grossing film.
Starring: Matthew McConaughey, Anne Hathaway, Jessica Chastain, Bill Irwin, Ellen Burstyn, Michael Caine
Following the end of his Batman films, Nolan released “Interstellar.” Set in a dystopian future where Earth is suffering from catastrophic blight and famine, the film follows a group of astronauts who travel through space in search of a new home for humanity.
Starring: Fionn Whitehead, Tom Glynn-Carney, Jack Lowden, Harry Styles, Aneurin Barnard, James D’Arcy, Barry Keoghan, Kenneth Branagh, Cillian Murphy, Mark Rylance, Tom Hardy
Made largely with practical effects, including explosions, “Dunkirk” follows the Dunkirk evacuation of World War II from the land, air and sea using minimal dialogue to build suspense. It features an ensemble cast and is told in a non-linear format. It marks Nolan’s second Best Picture and first Best Director nominations at the Oscars, though both lost to “The Shape of Water.”
Starring: John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Dimple Kapadia, Michael Caine, Kenneth Branagh
Perhaps Nolan’s most divisive film, “Tenet” was the first major movie to open in theaters during the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s a complex film with intricate character timelines, ambiguities and hidden details. “Tenet” follows the “Protagonist,” a CIA officer (Washington) who is recruited into a secret organization and tasked with tracing the origin of objects that are traveling backward through time. Alongside his handler (Pattinson), the Protagonist must also figure out the objects’ connection to an attack by the future.
Starring: Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt, Matt Damon, Robert Downey Jr., Florence Pugh, Josh Hartnett, Casey Affleck, Rami Malek, Kenneth Branagh
Nolan won his first Academy Awards for directing and producing “Oppenheimer,” an epic biopic of the man who helped develop the world’s first nuclear weapons. Murphy and Downey Jr. also won Oscars for their portrayals of J. Robert Oppenheimer and Lewis Strauss, respectively.
“Oppenheimer” levels up on everything Nolan has been working to perfect in his career, including use of IMAX black and white film for select scenes, a non-linear timeline, practical effects and additional scenes filmed on a combination of IMAX and large-format film, and is a reason why “The Odyssey” is one of the most anticipated blockbuster films of the year.
‘The Odyssey’ (2026)
Starring: Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, Lupita Nyong’o, Samantha Morton, Zendaya, Charlize Theron
While “The Odyssey” is not streaming yet (and is definitely a movie designed to be seen on the biggest screen with the loudest sound), it will eventually be available to buy or rent on-demand before making its exclusive streaming premiere on Peacock. Dates have not been confirmed yet, but “The Odyssey” could follow a timeline similar to “Oppenheimer,” which debuted in theaters in July 2023, on-demand in November 2023 and on Peacock in February 2024.
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This article was written by Angela Tricarico, Commerce Streaming Reporter for Post Wanted Shopping, Page Six, and Decider.com. Angela keeps readers up to date with cord-cutter-friendly deals, and information on how to watch your favorite sports teams, TV shows, and movies on every streaming service. Not only does Angela test and compare the streaming services she writes about to ensure readers are getting the best prices, but she’s also a superfan specializing in the intersection of shopping, tech, sports, and pop culture. When she’s not writing about (or watching) TV, movies, and sports, she’s also keeping up on the underrated perfume dupes at Bath & Body Works and testing headphones. Prior to joining Decider and The New York Post in 2023, she wrote about streaming and consumer tech at Insider Reviews.
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