{"id":692587,"date":"2026-07-15T07:35:11","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T07:35:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/692587\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T07:35:11","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T07:35:11","slug":"the-odysseys-christopher-nolan-made-cast-watch-three-classic-films-before-shooting-began","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/692587\/","title":{"rendered":"The Odyssey\u2019s Christopher Nolan made cast watch three classic films before shooting began"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Your support helps us to tell the story<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iOIawn\">From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it&#8217;s investigating the financials of Elon Musk&#8217;s pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, &#8216;The A Word&#8217;, which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iOIawn\">At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.<\/p>\n<p class=\"sc-1uza6dc-0 iOIawn\">The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.<\/p>\n<p>Your support makes all the difference.Read more<\/p>\n<p>Before the cast and crew of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/the-odyssey\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">The Odyssey<\/a> started filming, director <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/christopher-nolan\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Christopher Nolan<\/a> screened three films to watch in preparation.<\/p>\n<p>Nolan has long put on screenings of films ahead of shooting movies, and his adaptation of the Homer poem was no different \u2013 he <a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=AAULMO8BY4w\">told The Independent<\/a> that he looked at certain films for \u201ctextures that might inspire us\u201d, stating: \u201cUsually, those influences are pretty indirect.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>For the filmmaker, good sources of inspiration included Andrei Tarkovsky\u2019s Andrei Rublev (1966), Akira Kurosawa\u2019s feudal epic Ran (1985) and Martin Scorsese\u2019s The Last Temptation of Christ (1988). He called Ran \u201csuch an incredible film,\u201d hailing its use of \u201clandscape and wind, in particular\u201d.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Screenshot-2026-07-14-at-11-57-14.png\"  loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"'Ran' was a big inspiration for Christopher Nolan's 'The Odyssey'\" class=\"sc-1mc30lb-0 ggpMaE inline-gallery-btn\"\/>&#8216;Ran&#8217; was a big inspiration for Christopher Nolan&#8217;s &#8216;The Odyssey&#8217; (Toho)<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe watched the film and thought, &#8216;Yeah, the banners flapping in the wind and everything \u2013 that&#8217;s an important part of what we&#8217;re doing.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/arts-entertainment\/films\/features\/the-odyssey-2026-movie-christopher-nolan-b3012515.html\">Nolan said<\/a> The Last Temptation of Christ was required viewing forThe Odyssey as it is \u201ca fresh and accessible window into history\u201d.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe look at a lot of films, really not for the specifics, really for a generalised inspiration of what the texture of a film can be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The Dark Knight and Inception director also credited the success of 2023 film Oppenheimer with enabling him to make The Odyssey in exactly the way he wanted.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cComing out of Oppenheimer, which was a film that had far more success than we&#8217;d ever imagined, it leaves you with an opportunity,\u201d he told the outlet. <\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/Andrei-Rublev-Last-Temptation-Of-Christ.jpg\"  loading=\"lazy\" alt=\"Nolan screened 'Andrei Rublev' and 'The Last Temptation of Christ' before 'The Odyssey'\" class=\"sc-1mc30lb-0 ggpMaE inline-gallery-btn\"\/>Nolan screened &#8216;Andrei Rublev&#8217; and &#8216;The Last Temptation of Christ&#8217; before &#8216;The Odyssey&#8217; (Mosfilm\/Universal Pictures)<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou have the chance to do something that you wouldn\u2019t have otherwise. And so the scale of The Odyssey, and what that was gonna require, was suddenly possible.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The film, starring Matt Damon, follows Odysseus\u2019s long journey home to Ithaca after the Trojan War as he battles monsters, gods and mythical foes while his wife Penelope (Anne Hathaway) fends off suitors and son Telemachus (Tom Holland) searches for him.<\/p>\n<p><a rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/arts-entertainment\/films\/news\/nolan-odyssey-matt-damon-imax-cameras-b2752202.html\">It is the first feature film to be shot entirely on IMAX film cameras<\/a>, made possible after the director worked with film presentation pioneer David Keighley to develop lighter, quieter equipment capable of handling dialogue-heavy scenes.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe Dark Knight was the first film where we were able to go to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/topic\/imax\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">IMAX<\/a> and say, \u2018Lend us your cameras \u2013 let\u2019s try this on things like the introduction of the Joker, the truck flip,\u2019\u201d he told The Independent. <\/p>\n<p>\u201cBut we couldn\u2019t do the dialogue scenes because the cameras are very, very loud. So knowing we were doing The Odyssey, I went to IMAX and said, \u2018Look, if ever we\u2019re gonna do a whole film on IMAX, this is the movie to do it with\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Your support helps us to tell the story From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":692588,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[96,59,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-692587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-entertainment","tag-gb","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=692587"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/692587\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/692588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=692587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=692587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=692587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}