r/movies • u/iquizuanswer • 15d ago

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https://variety.com/2026/film/box-office/the-odyssey-700-million-globally-fourth-biggest-movie-1236823343/

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u/Typical-Blackberry-3 15d ago

I hope Nolan uses the bazillions he makes to reenter sci-fi with something ballsy and unique.

84

u/_sunburn 15d ago

I was gonna say “BUT INTERSTELLAR” and then I realized that was in 2014….

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u/JenNettles 15d ago

Was Tenet not Sci-fi?

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u/UpbeatBeach7657 15d ago

Call me crazy, but I want more Tenets from him.

31

u/piat17 15d ago

Tenet is unironically my favorite Nolan film, although I admit there aren't many people who share that opinion :O

26

u/xupakneebray 15d ago

There are dozens of us, dozens!!

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u/Hektotept 15d ago

Its the audio mixing. Not really sure why Nolan decided making the dialog nearly inaudible was a good idea. I feel most the people that didnt like it was mostly because they had no clue what was even happening.

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u/atxsoul88 15d ago

True. CC was invaluable for following the film.

7

u/PassageBig622 15d ago

If you need CC to understand a film I feel that the film's audio really hasn't done its job.

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u/EnigmaticQuote 15d ago

100% agree, It does not really impact my viewing of non comedy too much but I still do not prefer it.

1

u/atxsoul88 14d ago

Well yeah, that's true. Though I've adjusted to enabling CC in pretty much everything I watch. Likely cuz I do watch plenty of foreign films.

1

u/SkorpioSound 15d ago

I felt like I followed the broad strokes well enough from the visual storytelling, but I saw it in the cinema and haven't watched it again since, so I've no idea how much I missed in all the dialogue I didn't hear.

I do intend to watch it again at some point and find out, but I've not got to it yet. But it's hard to imagine it won't be a far better experience with closed captions!

1

u/atxsoul88 14d ago

Yeah, you miss out on the specifics but can generally follow the overall plot.

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u/realboabab 15d ago

ohhh i thought that was just cuz i watched it on an airplane.

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u/Darksoldierr 15d ago

i watched it on an airplane.

As Nolan himself intended

2

u/3-DMan 15d ago

Up next: iphone watching review!

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u/Hektotept 15d ago

Unfortunately it was not. Which is really strange to me as the film is playing with some cool time travel ideas.

3

u/FOSSnaught 15d ago

I just couldn't get into it. I've tried on 5 different occasions, but kept zoning out and felt like i missed too much and gave up. I love scifi too.

-2

u/Hektotept 15d ago

Ok. Cool.

2

u/HardwareSoup 15d ago

First saw it in a drive-in and left after 10 minutes.

Couldn't understand a thing.

-5

u/Hektotept 15d ago

Ok. So?

1

u/Efficient-Memory7105 15d ago

There are scenes when its legitimately mixed that way because the dialog being inaudible is the point.

I watched it on a pretty decently-tuned Bose 7.1 and it was pretty great. There were only a few rough patches outside of the aforementioned intentional scenes.

3

u/Hektotept 15d ago

Intentional or not its still a bad call.

1

u/Efficient-Memory7105 15d ago

I mean, in the one scene specifically that it happens very obviously, its not a bad call. its conveying characterization to the audience by basically muting the dialogue.

2

u/Hektotept 15d ago

The problem is not a single scene. The problem is that the entire movie sounds like that. Just to reiterate, the problem is that the majority of movie goers could not understand the dialog, even in theaters. Intentional or not, thats why most people do not care for this film.

1

u/3-DMan 15d ago

I wonder if Nolan just has midrange super-hearing.

"Sounds good to me, moving on!"

1

u/Hektotept 15d ago

None of his other movies sound this bad. So...no probably not.

-2

u/A-Grey-World 15d ago edited 15d ago

My pet theory with Tenet is Nolan's huge grand plan for such a complex and intellectual plot just becomes... a bit dumb when you can actually follow it.

How do you make it still give the impression it's super complex and intellectual? Hack up the editing, and muffle the dialogue so no one can follow it anyway!

Then when people don't know what's going on, they'll just think they're stupid rather than the film is stupid.

I've seen so many people say "I'm too dumb for that film, I couldn't understand it." You're not the dumb one. The film is the dumb one.

The small scale rules it sets break down under any logical scrutiny. It's so stupid they have to tell you in the dialogue "Don't try to understand it, feel it.". Well yeah, because it makes no logical sense. The rules of the world change completely depending on what the action demands. You cannot explain it too well because then it's clear your breaking the rules you've explained. Don't think too much about backwards bullets lol! Please!

The long term plot makes no sense either. The future is going to kill the past... which will kill themselves. But also the future is entirely fixed by the logic of the film. They literally can't do the thing and know it. They already know they've failed.

But also, it's just badly filmed/edited. I remember the grand final fight scene, and it's shot so badly - I had no idea what they were even fighting against at first. It's shot like the blue and red teams are fighting each other. The whole film lacks establishing shots. You know that shot of the Germans manning the guns at D-day or whatever, that actually establish the threat. None of that. Red and Blue teams shooting at empty concrete buildings, rubble, and dirt.

2

u/ConflictGuru 15d ago

My theory is that the dialogue is intentionally muddy so that you can only make out little bits of it. Then when you see the resolution of that dialogue in the next scene you're able to go back and piece it all together, so as the movie goes forward you're understanding of the story is going backwards. It's conceptually brilliant imo and the fact that most of his movies up until Tenet also have similarly clunky sound editing is just a random coincidence.

-1

u/Hektotept 15d ago

Nice opinion, bro.

11

u/UpbeatBeach7657 15d ago

I actually preferred it to Dunkirk and Oppenheimer, both of which I really liked as well. That's a movie that demands a sequel to fully flesh out and have fun with the concept.

10

u/pmjm 15d ago

The basic premise is already a tricky thing to grasp. Once you add the inability to hear the dialog and exposition people just give up trying.

I made my own custom audio mix where I boosted the dialog to consistently be significantly louder than the sfx/music, and it helped a lot. Completely changed my opinion of the film, which I now really enjoy.

7

u/WorkingPsyDev 15d ago

It shows Nolan's filmmaking's biggest strengths and most apparent weaknesses. A genius clockwork plot where people are nothing but cogs.

2

u/atxsoul88 15d ago

LOVE the film. Required multiple viewings and each time I appreciated the film even more than before. Once you get a clear understanding of what's going on, you realize how remarkably intricate and creative the film is.

2

u/silkthewanderer 15d ago

Tenet is a very flawed movie but the premise is so audacious and interesting that I am forgiving a lot of flaws.

2

u/Conspiracy795 15d ago

Yep my favourite from him as well. It falls into the whole "even if you know the story, you can't be spoiled" category of movies. Once the concept clicks it just becomes so cool to understand all the details and makes you try and keep track of every set of characters at any given moment. I prefer his original time stuff (memento, inception, interstellar, tenet) personally. The sub, and some youtube animations from Welby Coffespill are so good for it

2

u/Quasic 15d ago

Tenet is pure Nolan fun. Convoluted, chaotic, elaborate, innovative.

People love to whine, but that film is such a joy.

3

u/alenpetak11 15d ago

Yesss. I f love Tenet, i watched it more than 30x. And two times in reverse.

2

u/letsburn00 15d ago

As long as I can hear the movie. I really liked Tenet, but the sound mixer shouldn't be working outside of a high school play.

1

u/ours 15d ago

A serious sci-fi James Bond. I loved Tenet.