Directed by Christopher Nolan (Memento, Inception, Dunkirk, Insomnia, The Dark Knight, The Prestige) and starring John David Washington (BlacKkKlansman; MalcolmX), Robert Pattinson (Twilight; Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire; Water for Elephants; Maps to the Stars; The Lighthouse); Kenneth Branagh (Hamlet; My Week with Marilyn; Henry V; Murder on the Orient Express; Jack Ryan, Shadow Recruit; Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets; Wallander (TV series)); Elizabeth Debicki (Peter Rabbit; Guardians of the Galaxy: Vol. 2; The Man from U.N.C.L.E.; The Great Gatsby; The Night Manager (TV series); The Crown (TV series)).
The production/marketing companies behind Tenet advise first-timers to "Feel it and not try to understand it", recommending audiences to watch the film more than once. Normally this would be viewed as purely a marketing ploy to boost audience numbers but, in this case, it is clear why. It's complex.
Is it too complex for the ordinary viewer? Possibly. Probably. But that should not detract from going to see it, once anyway, and then deciding on whether to watch it again or not, in trying to understand it.
Superficially, Tenet can be classified as a cross between Terminator, The Matrix and The Night Manager, with strong elements of each being incorporated into Christopher Nolan's latest offering - travelling back/forward in time, slowed down action scenes with bullets being shot (this time in reverse) and a crime figure that has an iron hold over his wife who cares deeply for their son. However, it also goes forward from the director's previous films such as Memento and Inception in which the issues of telling stories in reverse, etc., are used as the basis for those films.
The Protagonist (John David Washington) is a CIA agent who, along with Neil (Robert Pattinson), finds himself in what can only be described as a twilight world of international espionage. He is recruited by a mysterious organisation called Tenet to participate in a global assignment that "unfolds beyond real time".
His mission is to prevent Andrei Sator (Kenneth Branagh), a renegade Russian oligarch with precognition abilities, from starting World War III. He uses Kat Sator (Elizabeth Debicki) as a way of getting to her husband. Along the way, The Protagonist is exposed to the concept of "time inversion" and needs to understand and master it as a way of countering the threat that is to come.
Revealing any more of the plot would simply be confusing - even more confusing than it already is. Tenet is a complex film, intertwined with and within itself. The acting is superb and the SFX are special, but it is the storytelling that is genius. It offers action aplenty, with the "reverse" car chases of particular interest...
Not for everyone, possibly a Marmite-type film. Expect Tenet to be around in next year's awards season, regarding the writing / storytelling, acting and the special effects and the sound / score.
