Honestly, I have been waiting to watch a great time travel movie since "Interstellar" (2014), especially an intelligent one. "TENET" (2020) is the best science fiction movie, a bit too intellectual as well, that builds up an inspiring image in my head, just like "Inception" (2010).
I don't think that any time travel movie can top "Primer" (2004). In fact, no time travel movie can beat Primer, including "Donnie Darko" or "Looper" or "The Terminator." Forget time travel films, I don't think that any science fiction movie can surpass Primer in wit and intelligence, yet Primer just happens to be remarkably thought-provoking. TENET is full of reckless thrills and time travel explosions, a movie that I wouldn't call thought-provoking in front of Primer. Maybe Primer was a bit too thought-provoking, but TENET does have one advantage since it has numerous thrills, making it a captivating movie from the very start.
"TENET" seems to have the impression of a heist movie, which is evident from the first 10 minutes. After a literal heist job, a CIA Agent named "the Protagonist" is captured by the people handling security, and he already knows what to do in such situations. I am not sure if the Protagonist ("John David Washington") is his real name, but I'll stick with that name since he wants to be called by that. The Protagonist takes a suicide pill, which he later finds out was just a test. I felt like the scene had resemblances to the film "The Matrix," where "Neo" has to choose between the Red pill and the Blue pill.
An organization called TENET hires the Protagonist to run a set of tasks to prevent World War 3. The Protagonist and his new partner Neil ("Robert Pattinson") meets up with Priya ("Dimple Kapadia"), where they get instructions to steal plutonium-241 from Sator ("Kenneth Branagh"), the main antagonist. Now the movie is a heist movie again and becomes interesting.
The Protagonist makes the heist, and he meets Kat ("Elizabeth Debicki"), who later develops into a love interest. The love interest is the insignificant riveting theme of the movie. Kat is the wife of Sator, and she has a small story arc, or so I thought initially, but I later found out her role is much more than just being the wife or the love interest. Sator marries the abused wife Kat, and Kat has to put up with him because of her son. The Protagonist has a crush on Kat, and during a heist job with Neil, they bring her with them on their journey back in time. Meanwhile, Sator poses a threat to The Protagonist because Sator can also go back in time. He wants to go back in time and destroy reality.
Several scenes involve people and items from the future mingling with the present, and other shots include people just going to the past. I love the scene where The Protagonist fights a masked figure and goes to the past, then wears a mask and fights himself. Neil from the past saw him during this fight, so he already knew The Protagonist comes from the future, but he never tells The Protagonist about this encounter.
TENET looks like a classic Christopher Nolan film, looking similar to a collage of his movies. Apart from using hand-held cameras instead of CGI, along with great cinematographers, cast, crew, and highly-intellectual scripts. A 20-year-old anniversary, I would call it. "TENET" (2020) features WW3 near the end of "Dunkirk" (2017), time travel loops of "Interstellar" (2014), heist thriller, and intellectual aspects of "Inception" (2010), the Protagonist saves the day just like Batman in "The Dark Knight Trilogy," features crime thriller aspects with an antagonist who is an abusive husband just like "Insomnia" (2002), and uses neo-noir looks that it shares with the indie film "Following" (1998). "John David Washington" creates doubt his appearance, performing multiple times in the same scenes in TENET, just like in "The Prestige" (2006). TENET has a psychological thriller theme borrowed from "Memento" (2000), and both movies start from the end going backward, a lesson on entropy. One thing common among every Nolan movie is that none of his films have a lead actor as a woman. Things might change in the future since TENET is the first Nolan movie with a black man as its lead.
2020 has been difficult for blockbuster movies to get any revenue since the theatres shut down. The theatre studio is finding it hard to make revenue in the same way they used to, especially with summer movies getting postponed frequently. A large number of films are playing via the streaming service instead of playing in the theatres. Even Wonder Woman 84 was streaming in HBO Max instead of running in the theatres. Internet Streaming services are getting very popular nowadays. More than before, because of the COVID pandemic.
The Protagonist wants to know who hired him and who The Boss is. When The Protagonist finds out it is he who hires himself, it reminded me of "Looper" (2012). But in TENOR, The Protagonist goes ahead and becomes The Boss, in the end, closing all loopholes along the way. In brief terms, The Protagonist travels forward "in time," backward, forward, backward, until he becomes The boss. After a zigzag journey, The boss walks into a multiverse where multiple versions of himself are either traveling backward or forward in time. Meanwhile, he finds a new job, spending time hiring everyone who takes part in the original heist at the start of the movie, closing all loopholes along the way, and moving forward in time. At one point, The boss even says, "I'll See You In The Beginning, Friend," to an alternate version of Neil while hiring him as well.
A futuristic item sent back to the present is a captivating idea, principally the idea of inverted bullets. Many scenes involve The Protagonist shooting randomly and getting fired by an unknown assailant. Other spectacles involve Sator or Neil or someone else shooting, and that incident unfolding later as well. The "final" showdown is very intense, and it's anybody's game now. Cinematographer "Hoyte van Hoytema" helps Nolan in creating the IMAX movie. The production team shoots the film in real-time across multiple countries, ranging from the United States, India, and Europe. With pre-production starting as far as 2018, TENET gets released in late 2020, with some help from theoretical physicist "Kip Stephen Thorne" and composer "Ludwig Emil Tomas Göransson." TENET is a spectacle created by a highly talented team indeed, ranging from stuntman, composer, physicist, actors, and director-screenwriter, be it paid or unpaid.
TENET is a definite 3.5/4 recommend.
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