I always find myself conflicted when going into a Christopher Nolan movie. More often than not the most I get out of his movies is just entertainment, rarely ever going deeper than that. This is by no means a bad thing, but it doesn’t seem to be the general viewpoint that most people feel. Nolan’s films don’t feel as deep as people give them credit for or even how he sees them. So, when going into his latest movie, Tenat, I didn’t expect anything more than an Inception-esque film that can viciously entertain me for over two hours. I got what I expected with a little more that pleasantly surprised me. Nolan continues to flaunt his ego with a complicated thriller that makes Inception look like a easy-to-follow picture book. So before you contemplate risking your life going to the cinema, this is my review of Christopher Nolan’s Tenet.
This complicated plot revolves around the unnamed protagonist (John David Washington), who is placed on a mission to stop a would-be terrorist (Kenneth Branagh) from using a device that can bend time and could invoke a third world war. The protagonist is accompanied by a fellow agent, Neil (Robert Pattinson) who seems to know more about our lead than he knows about him. While investigating this mysterious villain, the protagonist learns of his ex-wife, Kat (Elizabeth Debicki) who is battling for custody over her son, while also being meticulously controlled by the aforementioned villain. While on their mission, the two protagonists learn more about these strange time manipulations; a reality that exists where time is inverted and things that happen will transfer into the normal reality. The protagonists are followed around by a mysterious figure in riot gear and a gas mask, a villain that is several steps ahead of the heroes, and a doomsday clock that is ticking in two different directions.
The movie cannot rely solely on it’s time-bending gimmick, there needs to be a great leading actor that keeps the audience engaged. The unnamed protagonist of this movie isn’t an incredibly fleshed out character, rather he is something of an audience avatar. Nothing much is learned from the character outside of small tidbits of information that never truly contributes towards anything. I’m not sure if Nolan intended to make the character feel so flat, but is does create something of a disconnect that made it harder to be truly immersed. He isn’t completely blank, however, as he does show some clear emotions towards the supporting characters. He remains sympathetic towards Kat, taking the job into something more personal. It doesn’t force a romance between the two either, just the simple act of human kindness. These moments don’t completely forgive some of the character’s apparent flaws. How this character is considered one of the more talented agents in his field to take on such a grand task is questionable when he frequently makes mistakes and is somewhat forgiven of his actions very quickly when they pull out the time travel excuse.
For all the protagonist’s flaws, Robert Pattinson’s Neil felt much more interesting. Neil is an enigma that keeps you theorizing what his situation is exactly. Much like the protagonist, there isn’t much to his backstory, but this is done intentionally. Once we do learn a little more of his backstory, it doesn’t feel phoned in, rather, it gives you some more perspective on repeated viewings. The most interesting characters, however, actually come from our rivaled ex-spouses. Kat’s character is the most relatable part of the movie as we learn of her desperate struggle to both reunite with her son and to get rid of her abusive ex-husband. The more abusive scenes can feel genuinely terrifying, almost visceral and her desire to kill the man she once loved feels justified. The villain, Andrei, does feel a little cookie-cutter, showing a somewhat exaggerated anger towards anything, topped off with Branagh’s overly hammy fake accent. It didn’t always feel clear enough for exactly why he had gone this far off the tipping point, this confusion became something a running theme throughout.
This film has a similar complication to Nolan’s previous ‘Inception’, but probably more complex than that. While Inception focused on a multi-layered, mind-bending altering to reality, this movie presents an alternate reversed timeline that runs parallel to the main timeline. It becomes so complicated that it’s hard to tell if movies is sticking to it’s own rules. The narrative suggests that everything moves in reverse in this world, and yet there are later scenes where things move, such as cars and people, in a straightforward direction whilst everything else is reversed. I may simply be misinterpreting the rules, perhaps missing things, but this presents a major problem; complicating the plot simply to amaze it’s audience. These segments, which are prominent in the second half, are certainly entertaining but they come across as a hard-to-follow time explosion that left me constantly confused. I have seen people say that this film needs to be watched a second time to really enjoy anything, fitting to the movie’s plot, but this comes across as a cheap gimmick to make people think it’s so much deeper than it’s trippy entertainment. This may come across as myself hating the movie, but there is a lot to enjoy out of a movie that is vastly entertaining, I found myself enjoying much of the action of the film, but it did feel a little too goofy, even invoking some unintentional laughs. The music is also ridiculously overbearing, as is tradition for Nolan, the music was loud and obnoxious, ruining otherwise great scenes.
I feel that I came across as far too negative throughout the review. I view this in a very similar light to almost every one of Nolan’s movies; very entertaining but nothing ground-breaking. The time travel elements were a lot of fun to watch unravel and the cinematography, lighting, fight choreography and other technical aspects are well produced. The acting somewhat fluctuated between overly hammy to genuinely good. Had the film given the lead character some more depth and the story felt consistent from beginning to end, I may have given this more credit, but I only see this as on par with something like Inception, which I also felt was simply entertaining. To most people, entertainment is all you need, there isn’t anything wrong with that but I feel like a film should also challenge you, especially from a director that many see as a modern day Hitchcock despite the only thing he’s directed that has more depth is Memento, in my opinion. I do genuinely enjoy this movie, but I don’t plan on watching it twice just so I can understand it more. Go check it out if you want a good blockbuster action flick.
Written review by C. Johnson.