Unpublished film recorded in the “Last Colony of Africa” leaves Nolan under fire

Director is being widely criticized for filming the long -awaited film, whose tickets sold out a year from the premiere in Western Sahara, territory occupied by Morocco. Portugal is on the Moroccans side in this “Odyssey”.

It will cost 217.8 million euros And it will be the first always filmed movie with IMAX Chambers, Conceived to capture images with exceptionally high resolution, with a large film that allows you to display much larger images with unconscious and detail unprecedented, on the great IMAX screens, which are in theaters around the world.

But like most monumental works, “The Odyssey” (“A Odisseia”)by Christopher Nolan, does not escape the controversy.

“Normalize occupation” of the people Saharauí

Nolan is being harshly criticized for having chosen the city of Dakhlain the western Sahara, as one of the scenarios for the movie. The filming team arrived two weeks ago in the region, which has been under Moroccan occupation for 50 years, since Spanish decolonization.

Several organizations and personalities now accuse the filmmaker to contribute to the normalization of the occupation and the devaluation of the identity of the Saharauí people. The complaint initially came from the organizers of the Western Sahara International Film Festival (Fisahara).

“By shooting part of ‘O Odyssey’ in busy territory, Nolan and his team, perhaps unknowingly and unintentionally, are contributing to the Moroccan repression of the Sarauí people and to the efforts of the Moroccan regime to normalize the occupation of Western Sahara ”said María Carrión, executive director of Fisahara, in remembering that the territory is, according to reporters without borders, a “black hole of news” and a “”.

“Torture, the arrests, the physical abuse, the persecution, the intimidation, the harassment, the slander, the defamation, the technological sabotage and the long prison penalties are the daily life of Saharauis journalists,” says the RSF report.

“We are sure that if they understood all the implications of filming a high -level movie in a territory whose indigenous peoples cannot make their own films about their stories under occupation, Nolan and their team would be horrified,” says the official.

In the region, “authorities continued to restrict dissent and rights to freedom of association and peaceful meeting,” Amnesty International pointed out in the latest April.

Western Sahara is considered by a “Non -autonomous territory” that continues to fight for independence. The Government of Morocco claims the possession of most of the territory, despite the opposition of the Saharauís and the international community. But it was signed in 1991 the peace between the Moroccan Kingdom and the Independent Movement, Polisario Front, under the aegis of the UN and with the promise of a referendum on the future of the territory.

The festival appealed to Nolan, to its team and the ‘very loaded’ cast – which has stars like Matt Damon (Ulysses), Anne Hathaway (Penelope), Charlize Theron (Circe), Robert Pattinson (Hermes), Tom Holland (Telemaco), Zedaya (Athena) and Lupita nyong’oamong others – To demonstrate solidarity with the indigenous people Saharauí, “under military occupation for 50 years and regularly arrested and tortured by their peaceful struggle for self -determination.”

The actor Javier Bardem It was one of the few who on the subject with a harsh criticism on social networks.

“For 50 years, Morocco occupied West Sarah, expelling the Sarauí people from their cities. Dakhla is one of them, converted by Moroccan occupants into a tourist destination and now in a movie scenario, always with the purpose of erasing the Saharaui identity of the city. Another illegal occupation, another repression against a people, Saharaui, unjustly looted with the approval of the Western governments, Including the Spanish, ”wrote the award -winning Spanish actor.

Last week, the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Paulo Rangelconsidered the Moroccan proposal to assign greater autonomy to the western Sahara, but under the sovereignty of the king of Morocco, the “most serious, credible and constructive base” for a solution to the conflict.

Nolan has not yet publicly reacted to criticism.

A movie like never made

“The Odyssey” will be the most expensive movie of the career of the director, who “dates” the IMAX format since The Dark Knight (Dark Knight, 2008).

The version of the epic of Homero of the Spered, Intestellar and Oppenheimer director (among other classics) will only reach the movie theaters on July 17, 2026, but the first tickets exhausted a year before the premiere (And yes, it was probably the most distanced pre-sale of the debut in the history of cinema).

Just 26 salas Of the world’s cinema have the equipment and technical team needed to project in this format, Nolan’s favorite, who since his Batman has aimed to go further. In Europe, only London and Prague managed to have the privilege of the first tickets.

Already the Oscar winner of best film of 2024, OppenheimerIt was fully filmed in 65mm IMAX film, but the odyssey is more ambitious, with 70mm and filmed with IMAX cameras. Nolan will have convinced Imax to make more silent versions of the cameras to allow the recording of the dialogues.