Review of Tenet (2020) by Moviemitch96 — 03 Sep 2020

Christopher Nolan is one of my all-time favorite directors, so anytime he announces a new film, I'm already stoked for whatever it is! The man's a genius and constantly finds new and innovative ways to bend my mind and keep me guessing! Naturally, having greatly anticipated this latest film of his, I had high expectations, and I can happily say that they were met! Without going into too much detail (cause trust me, the less you know, the better), the film follows a nameless protagonist (John David Washington), who is recruited by a secret organization and tasked with stopping a potential global threat.

He also finds himself navigating and bending the laws of physics and time through his journey. First off, the most impressive aspect of this film was easily the action/stunts and effects. Nolan is a director who prides himself in using as little CGI as possible and relying more on realism and practical effects, and it certainly shows here, as everything is so well choreographed! Even more amazing is the fact that he was able to pull it off and incorporate it into the tricky time-inversion aspect of the film! The performances from all involved are stellar, with a great lead performance from John David Washington (fun fact: he's Denzel Washington's son), as well as some committed supporting turns from Robert Pattinson and a very villainous and sinister Kenneth Branagh.

In terms of plot and story, I can't even begin to go into too much detail about it, not because of spoilers, but because in all honesty, trying to explain it further would prove quite difficult for me, as it's quite an intricate web of a film.

All you should know is that laws are heavily defied and bent throughout, time and physics are unpredictable, and you'll have to follow carefully in order to catch a lot of details, but it's well worth your time.

There are some spots where the film seems to lose its footing a little and takes some unexpected detours, but it also happens to jump right into the action from the very opening scene, and hardly lets up until the very end of the film.

Overall, even at two and a half hours, it all feels very tense, tightly paced, and left me pretty floored by the end, even if I mostly felt that it doesn't quite live up to some of Nolan's previous films.

But the biggest word of caution I can offer is that like with many of Nolan's previous films (Memento, Inception, Interstellar, Dunkirk), the narrative and science can be a little hard to follow, but just stick with it as best you can, and it'll more than likely be worth it in the end.