A pirated copy of Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster The Odyssey briefly circulated on social media over the weekend, drawing millions of views before being removed, writes BBC.
According to Variety, an X (formerly Twitter) post containing a high-quality version of the film amassed around 2.1 million views in just two-and-a-half hours on Saturday before the account was suspended.
The leak quickly became a major talking point online, with users expressing disbelief that the entire three-hour epic had been uploaded to the platform.
“The full Odyssey movie in a tweet, as Nolan intended,” one user joked.
Another wrote, “The whole Odyssey film in an embedded video on Twitter. Crazy.”
A third user commented, “Someone leaked The Odyssey movie in HD. I thought it was fake but it’s true.”
According to The Hollywood Reporter, a lower-quality version of the film also surfaced on X on Sunday.
The upload remained online for around two hours before being removed after attracting nearly 50,000 views.
Responding to the incident, Universal Pictures confirmed it had acted swiftly to remove the unauthorised uploads.
“We became aware of the unauthorised posting of the film and immediately initiated takedown protocols,” the studio said in a statement.
“We take copyright infringement seriously and will pursue all appropriate remedies to protect our content and intellectual property rights.”
The leak comes despite Nolan’s repeated calls for audiences to experience The Odyssey on the biggest screen possible.
The Oscar-winning filmmaker shot the entire three-hour epic using 70mm IMAX film cameras, making it the first theatrical feature to be filmed entirely in the large-format IMAX 70mm format.
Nolan has long championed the cinematic experience, encouraging audiences to watch his films in premium large-format theatres to fully appreciate their visual scale and sound design.
Despite the online piracy incident, the leak appears to have had little impact on the film’s commercial momentum.
The Odyssey earned $215 million worldwide during its second weekend in cinemas, pushing its global box office total to approximately $640 million.
The film has become the biggest opening success of Nolan’s career and continues to perform strongly worldwide, fuelled by critical acclaim and positive audience reception.
