‘Tenet’ is not just another summer blockbuster. It’s a landmark film that will determine if audiences are ready to go back into cinemas. That’s a tremendous amount of pressure to carry on its shoulders. The real question to answer is whether it is any good. That is a resounding yes. Christopher Nolan delivers the goods with spectacular action sequences. Nolan loves to play with space and time. If you’re looking for a straightforward, connect the dots plot, some moviegoers may be a tad frustrated. Through the director’s trademark filmography including ‘Memento,’ ‘The Prestige,’ ‘Inception,’ and ‘Interstellar,’ he takes classical stories and molds them to fit his purpose that creates a complex narrative. ‘Tenet’ is no exception. The best way to describe it is a James Bond spy thriller that manipulates time. The bottom line is that ‘Tenet’ is an eye-catching spectacle you must appreciate on the big screen.
The film wastes no time setting the stage. The main character is simply known as The Protagonist (superbly played by John David Washington). He plays a C.I.A. agent who has infiltrated an operation to rescue an asset. In an opera house in the Ukraine, he sees a strange phenomenon. A bullet fired, reverses out of a nearby seat and the wood around the bullet hole seals up. The Protagonist finds himself on a boat when he thought he took a cyanide pill when captured. This turns out to be a test for a far greater mission. He is tasked to stop a plot to destroy the world. He is only given one word, ‘Tenet’ that “will open the right doors, and some of the wrong doors, too.”
Washington’s character is quickly introduced to the mysterious process of time “inversion.” It’s when an object or person can have its entropy reversed. This makes objects moving forward in time appear to be spooling backwards. It makes for some fascinating action sequences. His new mission leads him to a partner named Neil (a suave Robert Pattinson) and then to an arms dealer in India (Dimple Kapadia) whose apartment can only be accessed by bungee jumping cables. It’s another spectacular scene that eventually leads our hero to the Ukrainian baddie Andrei Sator (Kenneth Branagh) and his damsel in distress wife, Kat (Elizabeth Debicki) who is an art dealer that wants out of her unhappy marriage.
So you’re probably wondering if I’m going to spoil the plot. Well, the plot is so complex that’s impossible. A female scientist (Clemence Poesy) sums it up best. She tells The Protagonist, “Don’t try to understand it, feel it.” You don’t have to be a physicist to appreciate the concept of time-inversion. The grandiose scenes show the audience some objects run forward while others reverse. This movie has some of the most stunning action sequences caught on film. There is a race between catamarans off the Amalfi coast, there is an amazing car chase on a freeway to a 747 crashing into an airport hangar. If that wasn’t enough, there is a fight scene in a hallway that moves forward and backward in time.
This is an action film on another level. Tenet is a futuristic take on James Bond films. Let’s talk about the performances. John David Washington has the right swagger and charisma to carry off the superspy lead role. Pattinson is brilliant as the debonair colleague to Washington. They play off each other well. It was easy for me to invest into these characters. I wanted them to succeed in their mission. There comes a point in the film where you just have to let go. Let go of the baffling plot and embrace the thrill ride Nolan provides us. There is no doubt in my mind that Nolan knows how to deliver the big-screen thrills. The jury is still out whether it will make people leave their homes with their masks on and venture back into movie theaters. I certainly hopes so since ‘Tenet’ is wickedly entertaining.
