‘Spider-Man,’ ‘The Odyssey,’ and the summer of movie screen maximalism

Could Spider-Man and Odysseus singlehandedly save the theatrical box office? Maybe not completely. But with the release of Sony’s Spider-Man: Brand New Day and Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, they make a strong case for it. When the latest Spider-Man installment released this past weekend, it made $360 million at the domestic box office and a whopping $932 million globally. Now, in its second week, it earned another $145 million at the domestic box office and crossed the $1 billion mark globally. The Odyssey has made more than $460 million domestically and also crossed $1 billion worldwide...