Tenet

“Don’t try to understand it. Feel it.” I have grown up loving spy movies, who hasn’t? From James Bond’s envious lifestyle, his charming personality, the cars, the women and the gadgets. I mean it’s the epitome of escapist fantasy. So, when the news broke out that Nolan was finally tapping into the spy genre, I was absolutely excited. Not only because of the genre, but to see what kind of twist he brings to it.

Over the years we’ve all come to realize that with Nolan nothing is ever simple. With Inception he redefined the heist genre. With the Dark Knight trilogy, he basically put to rest a long-stated belief that movies relating to comic books are just for kids. And thanks to The Dark Knight, which is critically respected and was a humongous box office success, many people in the industry finally started taking the genre seriously. With Interstellar, he explored the vastness of space and expanded the realms of extreme possibilities.

With Tenet, he wanted to make a movie that engages his creative mind and works for the current audiences as well. Nolan has always been fascinated by time, as evidenced in his earlier movies. So, it only made sense that he made a spy movie with the element of time manipulation mixed in the middle. It’s the spy genre in its absolute grandeurness. Not a word, I’m aware, but you get the point.

Nolan took more than five years to write the screenplay. And this is after he played around with the idea for over a decade. And when you do watch the movie, you understand why. As a matter of fact, it was rightly said by Emma Thomas in an interview that they could not have made this movie before. Everything about this project is large scale. From the complexity of the idea to the filmmaking process. So, for the project to come to fruition, it required the mind of an experienced filmmaker and a crew who are well versed with the director’s process and can work in cohesion to make the project come to life.

So, let’s talk about the movie for a bit. To give a synopsis of the movie would be simple. A secret agent, called the “Protagonist” is recruited by an organization known as Tenet, and is asked to manipulate the flow of time to prevent World War 3. As I said quite simple. Well, no it isn’t that simple.

For most of the beginning I was just trying to keep up with the basic plot. Nolan directly throws you amidst an ongoing undercover operation at a Kyiv opera house, which by the way is a beautiful opening shot. Here we witness the first “what the fuck just happened?” sequence where the Protagonist is saved by a masked soldier, who “un-fires” a bullet through a gunman.

As the movie progresses, we learn that due to a new technology, the entropy of a person or an object can be reversed. Inversion happens when an object or a person passes through a machine called the turnstile, which was built by a scientist in the future. Once you come out on the other side, you can literally move back in time. Mind you this is not time travel. This is manipulation of time.

However, as is the case with any technology, humans are capable of finding a way to weaponize it. An algorithm is created which has the capability of inverting time itself. There by essentially wiping out everything that ever lived. Yup try wrapping your head around that concept. But before it could be used, the algorithm was separated into nine different pieces and sent back in time by the scientist. Now in retrospect, I do understand the reason why the future generation wants to wipe out its predecessors. The future that they live in is a bleak and fucked up reality, which was caused by the people living in the present. So ya, I get it.

The people from the future hell bent on undoing the devastations that lead to their reality, find a man to conduct their work in the present. Enter Andrei Sator, the worst of humanity. At the brink of a losing war with cancer, the egoistical monster that he is, believes that the world should end with him.

The complexities of the plot become even more clear when you realize that only the person’s entropy is inverted, so everything else is moving forward as usual. Which absolutely enhances the experience of watching an action sequence. Most notably the highway car chase sequence, which in my opinion was a bloody thrilling experience and the fight sequence at the Freeport. We see both these sequences at two different points during the movie thus revealing to us that these scenes are presented through two different perspectives, the original protagonist and the inverted protagonist.

The final battle between the good and the evil to prevent the destruction of the world is an experience unlike any other. I mean just before when I mentioned that the complexities become clear. Well, here it intensifies to a whole different level. The scale of the sequence is so immense. Just watching it I was just trying to catch up to what the characters were doing. Who is where and at what time? There are people moving forward and some moving backward. This is all happening at the same time. It’s an absolute pleasure to watch everything that we’ve been experiencing, pay off in the end.

John David Washington in an interview described the final sequence as “Dunkirk on steroids” and I couldn’t have said it better myself. That is exactly what it feels like. In the end, World War 3 was prevented, and we do find out that this entire movie was a long temporal pincer movement, and it was all orchestrated by the Protagonist himself. Well, the protagonist from the future. I know, it’s a lot of information to be processed, especially with the fast pacing. I’m yet to figure out how many versions of Neil were actually there during the final battle sequence and how it all played out.

Now this movie is even more complex than Inception, which is saying something. Understanding the concept of entropy in itself is not simple, and here we’re talking about inverted entropy. There are enough explanations to aid you along the way. But since Nolan believes his audiences are intelligent enough to figure things out themselves, there are not a lot of in-your-face expositions. This movie clearly demands multiple viewings to fully appreciate each and every scene. But that is the fun of it, isn’t it?

But even if you don’t fully understand it, it’s still a journey, in my opinion, unlike any other. As the scientist in the movie says, “Don’t try to understand it. Feel it.”

So, let’s talk about the characters of the movie. Now Nolan says that he doesn’t quite understand acting, he’s not studied it. He can direct, that’s what he’s good at. And yet every movie you watch of his, from Following to Tenet, he seems to always be able to pick the perfect actors. Which is also something pointed out by Kenneth Branagh in an interview. He may not know how to act, but he sure as hell can recognize the potential.

The Protagonist played by John David Washington- Spies are quite fascinating, as so rightly pointed out by Nolan himself. They are inherently cynical yet there is a sense of selflessness in their actions. You take Ethan Hunt or James Bond for example. These are larger than life characters, who are grounded in reality by the emotions that dictate their actions. And that is exactly what John David Washington brings to this character. He absolutely commands every scene that he is in. Being an athlete, you can see how his physicality was used, and he was pushed to the limit.

Michael Crosby played by Michael Caine- As we’ve witnessed since Batman Begins, Nolan simply does not make a movie without including Michael Caine in some way. In what is one of the pivotal scenes in the movie, adds an extra layer of excitement as you watch JDW and Cain play off each other.

Neil played by Robert Pattinson- I have to admit that I did dismiss Pattinson for the longest time and that was purely based on his performance in the Twilight series. But can you really blame me? Yes, yes you can, definitely. I should have known better. But nonetheless my opinion changed when I saw him in Good Time. His in-depth performance of a bank robber who is desperately trying to get his brother out of police custody is arguably one of his best works. And from there on I started following his work. He’s been challenging himself ever since he finally escaped the restrictions of a mega franchise. He’s more than proved himself to be worthy of being called an actor and not just a celebrity.

Priya Singh played by Dimple Kapadia- An arms dealer operating from Mumbai. Usually, Indian actors are never given a crucial role in Hollywood movies. Yes, I’m looking at you amazing spider-man. But thankfully Dimple Kapadia gets one of the most crucial roles in the movie, as her character is an important element in moving the story forward. She is a wonderful actress and in this she more than proves why Nolan chose her specifically.

Kat played by Elizabeth Debicki- She plays a smart, confident and manipulative art dealer. Usually, she can manoeuvre her way out of anything. But after selling a fake Goya drawing to Sator, she finds herself trapped in a loveless marriage, struggling to get herself and her son out.

Andrei Sator played by the extremely talented Kenneth Branagh- An appalling piece of destructive force that should not exist but does. Kenneth absolutely captures the very essence of his vileness. The character is a despicable person, there are no two ways about it. Now every villain has their own sense of logic behind their actions and also there is a past that moulds them. But with Sator, any humane quality that may try to crawl its way out is immediately suppressed by his egoistical actions. He’s the worst of humanity.

Every character is grounded in reality, their afflictions are something that the audiences can hold onto in a film that is so extremely beyond, at least on the first viewing, normal understanding.

Coming back to the man behind this epic espionage sci-fi thriller. This is undoubtedly his most technically challenging film. Even the finest professionals in their field were baffled by the complexity of actually achieving what was on paper. But since Nolan likes to get everything in camera, they had to figure out an innovative way to do it.

The minimalist use of CGI is always refreshing to experience in a world where the cinema is dominated by such movies. With practical effects, the element of danger is real, which enhances your experience. Just consider the crashing of the plane scene. It was such a thrilling experience to watch it knowing that they actually crashed a plane.

Even when you’re watching the scene twice, from two different perspectives, it’s not just simply reversed. Those scenes are actually shot twice. Take the Freeport hand-to-hand combat scene. JDW had to shoot that sequence four different times, twice as the protagonist and twice as the inverted protagonist, so that it can be edited later for us to get the perspective of two different people.

With the hand-to-hand combat sequences, they had to mix a bit of dance movements into the fight. Different techniques and different fight sequences were spliced together to bring you the exciting action that you see on screen.

You can recreate a particular location in the studio, but you cannot recreate the beauty. Which is why it’s important for Nolan to shoot on actual locations, as it can amplify your viewing experience and also organically move the story forward.

Music has always been an integral part of Nolan’s movies. It’s not just an added experience, but a part of the story telling. Every musical note has to parallel the character and the sequence. This time around Nolan couldn’t work with his regular collaborator, Hans Zimmer. But I must say that Ludwig Göransson’s beautiful musical score is so close to what Zimmer would have achieved that I honestly didn’t miss his presence.

The film is seamlessly edited by Jennifer Lame. Hoyte van Hoytema’s cinematography is absolutely gorgeous. He has got a cinematic vision that has made him one of the most prominent cinematographers currently working. The number of shots he was able to capture using an IMAX camera is quite surprising. He actually carries the IMAX camera on his shoulders and runs around shooting the scene. It’s just so fucking amazing.

It is so creatively orgasmic to watch the making of the movie and see how everything was put together. This is a technical marvel unlike any other.

Till next time then.