Review: Tenet

Created By: Christopher Nolan

Directed By: Christopher Nolan

Starring: Robert Pattinson, John David Washington, Kenneth Branagh and Elizabeth Debicki

I Would Say: 4/5

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When a secret agent is brought into a time-bending world of the past future and the present he is left to figure out how he could stop world war III for starting. And of course, it is totally all over a Nolan Film.

I will start by saying this film is just as many expected 110% Nolan, I saw it in the cinema and after holding in a wee for too long I knew I needed to run there and back as fast as I could so I didn't miss the small yet hugely important detail that could make the whole film. I have for a while been a fan of Nolan, and not till I really started to appreciate film did I notice just how impressive he is as not only a director but also a storyteller. I left the cinema asking myself 1. how anyone comes up with a story like this and 2. how he keeps being able to come up with plots that hurt my head. Compared to other films like Dunkirk and Batman which I would say are his more 'tame' creations Tenet follows a similar idea to Inception, that theme, of course, being time and the many different ways in which your life could be altered due to it. Without giving away too many spoilers this films runs with 2 storylines that run parallel to each to each other, meeting somewhere at the end. It has the very satisfying ending of tying things up nicely while also not concluding everything as to leave it open to interpretation; another Nolan classic; remember the spinning totem? Something which after a running time of 2h 30min is a nice break and then recharge for your brain.

Due to going into this film knowing I would need to pay attention throughout I came away with a lot from it. I won't lie I was worried about the casting of Robert Pattinson, through no fault of 13 year old me loving Twilight and hoping that I wouldn't see Edward Cullen staring back at me, just as much as I was a little surprised about him as Batman, but at no point was there anyone in front of me apart from who was meant to be, in a recent interview Robert Pattinson admitted to now only taking roles that interested him immensely, something which I have no doubt was the reasoning behind this role, I can only imagine the script and having gone through it for the first time, knowing this was something he needed to be in. Due to the nature of the film and how it plays out describing the pairing of Pattinson and Washington is hard for me to get my head around, it works very well, and I liked it, and not until the end when a few loose ends were tired up did the thing that I wasn't getting make sense as to why. The same goes for John David Washington, definitely now outside of his dad's shadow he held the weight of this film up, I felt that we as the audience were finding elements out at the same time as his character, we were as much in the dark as he was about certain things, apart from the one element that I guessed everything else was left to be discovered just as Nolan wanted me to.

I wasn't expecting anything less than drama and action throughout this whole film, and I wasn't disappointed. Time travel and action I feel come hand in hand when looking at big movie budgets and seeing that yes they really did crash that plane along with other elements which would have pulled the budget up I was drawn into all that was going on throughout, but I did also ask myself was it needed, being the devils advocate as they say and trying not to take too much away from the trailer I was hoping it wasn't all bangs and firepower with nothing left for the film itself. I'm still mixed about this, because yes, of course, the action makes the film, but equally, if it wasn't there then maybe there could have been a little something more, but don't ask me what as to that my brain couldn't even think of 1/10 of this storyline.

Would I need to watch it again to understand it, it normally the question I ask myself when leaving any Nolan film, and I think I will not be the first person to wonder if I missed anything, I mean maybe those 3 minutes I was peeing did make a difference, but then I think this is just the norm for a film like this, I asked myself the same question after Inception and even after other Nolan films like Shutter Island, Gone Girl and Girl on the train. I would say that I do not need to watch Tenet again to understand it but I would say I know for sure if did I would pick up on more than I even thought I already had.

Tenet is I think the most Nolan film Christopher Nolan has ever made, I'm hunting down the script to see if my head could ever get around it and if not then I'll just be left in bewilderment that someone could write that.

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