Review of Tenet (2020) by Brent_Marchant — 06 Sep 2020

Director Christopher Nolan's latest blockbuster -- the film on which the movie industry has pegged its hopes for drawing viewers back into theaters -- unfortunately fails spectacularly in its appointed mission.

While the action sequences and some of the special effects make for terrific eye candy, the ridiculously convoluted plot is so hard to follow that one really needs pause and rewind buttons to absorb it all.

What's more, the picture's look and feel seem like they could have been taken out of an "Inception" sequel but without a comparable emotional connection. Kenneth Branagh's fine supporting performance adds some spark and life to this offering, somewhat helping to make up for the deadpan and uncharacteristically disappointing portrayal by John David Washington.

Clearly this is a film enamored with its own cleverness and gimmickry, but such qualities -- no matter how expert they might be -- can never compensate for the lack of a good narrative, something desperately missing from this overlong, underwhelming effort.

About the only truly positive thing I can say about "Tenet" is that it looks good on a big screen, something viewers who really want to see it should do while it's still in theaters. (Oh, and by the way, I saw this one in a movie theater -- and lived to tell about it.

Get over those fears already, folks.