Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is already a fancy story to movie with out the Oscar-winning director being urged to close down filming and transfer to a brand new location by the Western Sahara Worldwide Movie Pageant. The criticism of Nolan taking pictures his subsequent potential awards darling have come as he filmed scenes for the upcoming epic within the Morrocco-occupied space close to the town of Dakhla, a “non-self-governing territory” as designated by the UN in 1963.
Nolan is definitely not the primary filmmaker to arrange cameras on the location to make use of its sandy backdrops and burning vistas to be witnessed on cinema screens and TV. One of the current initiatives to be filmed there was Prime Video’s The Wheel of Time, though with the cancellation of the sequence these cameras won’t be returning to the world. The piece of land in query will not be a part of Morrocco in a authorized sense, however many imagine it ought to be, and that’s the place the controversy lies, particularly when the U.S. is among the many governments who’ve endorsed Morocco’s declare on the land.
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The mythic motion characteristic is reportedly one of many director’s costliest films up to now.
Now, the FiSahara, which holds its pageant in Algeria’s Sahrawi refugee camps and beforehand gained the help of stars corresponding to Javier Bardem and Penelope Cruz, has urged Nolan to stop filming. In a press release (through Deadline), they mentioned:
“Dakhla isn’t just a fantastic location with cinematic sand dunes. Primarily, it’s an occupied, militarised metropolis whose indigenous Sahrawi inhabitants is topic to brutal repression by occupying Moroccan forces. By filming a part of The Odyssey in an occupied territory billed as a ‘information black gap’ by Reporters With out Borders, Nolan and his workforce, maybe unknowingly and unwillingly, are contributing to the repression of the Sahrawi folks by Morocco.
“We’re certain that have been they to grasp the total implications of filming corresponding to high-profile movie in a territory whose indigenous peoples are unable to make their very own movies about their tales underneath occupation, Nolan and his workforce can be horrified.
“Morocco routinely touts Sahrawi cultural expressions as uniquely Moroccan. They created a movie pageant in Dakhla to counter ours, and produce high-budget movies that painting Western Sahara as a part of Morocco. Nevertheless, Sahrawis making an attempt to make movies about their lives are persecuted and should work clandestinely and at nice danger to themselves and their households.”
Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Odyssey’ Might Be His Greatest Film But
Christopher Nolan doesn’t make small films. After blowing away his Oscar competitors with Oppenheimer, his newest challenge is now seeking to make that appear to be a highschool challenge. The Odyssey comes with a forged as epic as its story, with an intensive listing of stars together with Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Zendaya, Anne Hathaway, Lupita Nyong’o, Robert Pattinson, Benny Safdie, Charlize Theron, Jon Bernthal, Himesh Patel, Elliott Web page, Invoice Irwin, Samantha Morton, Jesse Garcia, Will Yun Lee, and Corey Hawkins.
Tickets for the film are already on sale, and the primary teaser was launched just a few weeks in the past, delivering only a tease of Damon’s Odysseus, and a number of other different characters. Set for launch on July 17, 2026, Nolan’s film has been filming in a number of far-flung places in Morocco, Italy, Eire, and Scotland. Though the precise method Nolan will play Homer’s epic poem of Odysseus’ harmful return residence after the Trojan Warfare will not be but recognized, we already know a number of the visually gorgeous sights that will probably be given the total IMAX therapy within the film. This can embrace monstrous cyclops, sirens, gods, nymphs, the witch goddess Circe and a few intense excessive drama for Odysseus’ spouse Penelope, who’s awaiting his return whereas their house is taken over by these seeking to substitute him.
Supply: Deadline
The Odyssey
- Launch Date
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July 17, 2026
- Producers
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Emma Thomas