Review: TENET

The summer blockbuster season we know and love has been all but destroyed this year, well at least it would have been were it not for Tenet.

The latest motion picture from writer/director Christopher Nolan has a lot riding on it, being the first major motion picture released in cinemas since COVID struck. It's success or failure in cinemas will mean a lot for the industry going forward but all I can say is that there couldn’t have been a better film to be that film. As we all adjust to life as it is instead of as it was, time seems more relevant than ever and in Tenet, time is everything.

John David Washington is a CIA Agent in an undercover Russian Operation, however when the operation goes south, what seems like the end proves only to be the beginning, as his world view widens when a secret organisation introduces him to ‘time-based technology’. This technology is beyond modern comprehension, and not only could be cause of oncoming disaster but also the key to averting it.

Tenet is no simple time travel story. Early on, Clemence Poesy’s scientist says to our protagonist, “Don’t try to understand it. Feel it” and that really is indicative of the epic journey Nolan takes you on. Tenet is a complex, cunningly crafted cinematic conundrum you crazily want to crack. But I would advise two things, 1.) Have patience and 2.) Do indeed ‘feel it’ instead of overthinking it (if you can that is).

There are some films out there that almost feel as though, to fully decipher them, they should be viewed both forwards and backwards but with Tenet, it’s literally the case. This is spectacle cinema on a whole new technological and cerebral scale. Nolan’s writing is as rewarding to audience forbearance as it is wildly ambitious, and it makes for an entropy smashing Rubik’s cube that often makes Nolan’s equally mind-expanding works Interstellar and Inception seem straightforward by comparison.

Yet, as the film stretches forward, you are rewarded for your attention, as details are connected, the story inter-twines and you sometimes sit back smiling with sheer admiration thinking, much like Bruce Wayne did with Lucius Fox in Nolan’s The Dark Knight Rises, “oh now you’re just showing off”. As the director dissects time once again in his work, we see not only how precious it is but how those who respect its power can only create positive change, while those who seek to empower it only cause annihilation.

Washington is a compelling lead, at the head of a wonderful cast, he is both loyal and duty driven but not at the expense of losing who he is. While Robert Pattinson offers screen-grabbing charismatic support as Neil and Kenneth Branagh is downright disturbing as narcissistic Russian oligarch Andrei Sator. A number of fabulous smaller parts flourish thanks to a diverse collection of talent like Dimple Kapadia, Himesh Patel, Michael Caine and Aaron Taylor-Johnson. Though, it is actually Elizabeth Debicki as Andrei’s tortured wife Kat who provides the inner workings to this machine, as her story gives this whole impressive venture human cogs beneath its inverted hands of time.

Tenet is a staggering, painstaking and aspiring piece of work. Amazingly shot and assembled, it is a film that may take many revisits (both back to front and front to back) to fully unpack and appreciate as much as it deserves. But whether it’s one viewing or several, Tenet remains a mesmerising experience, one that can only be fully ‘felt’ on the big screen in every sense of that term. You feel the building blowing action. The immaculately constructed (and deconstructed) set pieces. The rumbling and slicingly powerful score from Ludwig Goransson. The excellent performances. The time shattering plot. Everything...you feel it all.

Cinema is facing challenging days now and in the future, but when you are sat there, in IMAX (as I was), witnessing such sights (Nolan regular in cinematographer Hoyte von Hoytema continues to outdo himself) and sounds, it is impossible to find anything more immersive than this moment. And we mustn’t lose it.

Tenet is a palindromic paragon in a year where time is everything for cinema and now’s the time to act!

!tca ot emit eht s’won dna amenic rof gnihtyreve si emit erehw raey a ni nogarap cimordnilap a si teneT

12
Director: Christopher Nolan
Starring: John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Dimple Kapadia, Michael Caine, Kenneth Branagh
Release Date: Out Now (Cinemas)