Tenet

[Liam Hall]

This evening I watched Tenet on a massive Imax screen and my head hurts.

You’ve got to hand to Nolan, he can see the future. In Tenet he’s made a film that will require so many viewings to work out what the hell is supposed to be going on it will more than make up for lost cinema revenue due to the pandemic!

[ahalpert]

...did you enjoy it?

[Batutta]

As I mentioned in another thread, I saw it in a completely empty theatre the other day. I definitely enjoyed it just as spectacle, as something I've never seen before. And it cements John David Washington's leading man status. The reverse time sequences I didn't find hard to follow really, but on a basic who needs what from whom and why level it's really confusing and hard to keep up with, to the point where it restricts your emotional involvement. And it could have used some more humour. I'd give it a solid B at least. That might go up with another viewing.

[Liam Hall]

...did you enjoy it?

I'm not sure yet.

It started well, with a great action sequence. Then it went into a series of scenes to set up the narrative and explain the faux-physics at the heart of the story. Some of these scenes I nearly laughed out loud at their ridiculousness. It felt like they hadn't quite worked it out themselves and twenty minutes in I said to myself this is Nolan's worst film. Forty-five minutes in, and despite Kenneth Branner doing a decent job as a Russian arms dealer and Elizabeth Debicki once again playing the fluffy, yet plucky wife I was convinced he'd lost the plot and become one of those insane megalomaniac directors where no one pushes back on their crazy ideas. But... ...then it all begins to make sense (sense, in terms of the faux-physics he painfully explained for forty minutes earlier) and then you can enjoy the spectacle. And it's quite a spectacle towards the end. Some very clever filmmaking even if the premise relies on some next level crazy physics.

Nolan's films are always interesting to watch and always have great soundtracks. I'm not sure how I'll feel about it in the morning. My head still hurts.

[Batutta]

It started well, with a great action sequence. Then it went into a series of scenes to set up the narrative and explain the faux-physics at the heart of the story. Some of these scenes I nearly laughed out loud at their ridiculousness. It felt like they hadn't quite worked it out themselves and twenty minutes in I said to myself this is Nolan's worst film. Forty-five minutes in, and despite Kenneth Branner doing a decent job as a Russian arms dealer and Elizabeth Debicki once again playing the fluffy, yet plucky wife I was convinced he'd lost the plot and become one of those insane megalomaniac directors where no one pushes back on their crazy ideas. But... ...then it all begins to make sense (sense, in terms of the faux-physics he painfully explained for forty minutes earlier) and then you can enjoy the spectacle. And it's quite a spectacle towards the end. Some very clever filmmaking even if the premise relies on some next level crazy physics.

SPOILERS



As I knew about the time reversing conceit before hand, I started to get impatient and wondered when that part of the story was going to kick in. In a typical story structure, the end of act one would be him stepping through the turnstyle...Then I realized...oh...he's showing us this hour of elaborate setup, so he can show it all again in reverse in a completely new way. It's a pretty ingenious break from conventional story structuring that I think makes the most of the conceit.

[JPNola]

I've always wanted there to be a film that has many styles / genres within it. That is, the film starts out, say, as a musical and then it transitions into drama-style and then comedy, then horror, then documentary style / reality-tv show, then back to musical, etc.

For the first 10 minutes the film is a light, happy musical and then someone in the musical is murdered and the film transitions to a crime-drama and in the midst of the crime-drama it shifts into a comedy or a tv game show, and so on. With the storyline and characters continuing throughout. I doubt that most audience members would be able to handle it and would become so thrown off and confused by it that they'd shutdown. Audiences are used to films sticking to one genre, needless to say.

Natural Born Killers did this briefly when it genre-shifted to a television family-comedy before shifting back.

I'm kind of surprised it hasn't been done more. The obvious reason why it hasn't is that it challenges the audience more than sticking to one genre and genre-shift would tend to take the audience "out" of the film in similar way that breaking the fourth-wall does.

But it would be highly original and cool to see done.

Any films you know of that do anything like this, other than Natural Born Killers?

[ahalpert]

I'm not sure yet.

It started well, with a great action sequence. Then it went into a series of scenes to set up the narrative and explain the faux-physics at the heart of the story. Some of these scenes I nearly laughed out loud at their ridiculousness. It felt like they hadn't quite worked it out themselves and twenty minutes in I said to myself this is Nolan's worst film. Forty-five minutes in, and despite Kenneth Branner doing a decent job as a Russian arms dealer and Elizabeth Debicki once again playing the fluffy, yet plucky wife I was convinced he'd lost the plot and become one of those insane megalomaniac directors where no one pushes back on their crazy ideas. But... ...then it all begins to make sense (sense, in terms of the faux-physics he painfully explained for forty minutes earlier) and then you can enjoy the spectacle. And it's quite a spectacle towards the end. Some very clever filmmaking even if the premise relies on some next level crazy physics.

Nolan's films are always interesting to watch and always have great soundtracks. I'm not sure how I'll feel about it in the morning. My head still hurts.

Great little review.

So basically - Inception 2?

I feel like Nolan has been going downhill after Dark Knight in increasingly outlandish attempts to outdo his own cleverness.

It's like he's obsessed with puzzles. Maybe he always was, but I think the characters and relationships were more foregrounded before and kept the plot together

[patrickbaldwin]

I've always wanted there to be a film that has many styles / genres within it. That is, the film starts out, say, as a musical and then it transitions into drama-style and then comedy, then horror, then documentary style / reality-tv show, then back to musical, etc.

For the first 10 minutes the film is a light, happy musical and then someone in the musical is murdered and the film transitions to a crime-drama and in the midst of the crime-drama it shifts into a comedy or a tv game show, and so on. With the storyline and characters continuing throughout. I doubt that most audience members would be able to handle it and would become so thrown off and confused by it that they'd shutdown. Audiences are used to films sticking to one genre, needless to say.

Natural Born Killers did this briefly when it genre-shifted to a television family-comedy before shifting back.

I'm kind of surprised it hasn't been done more. The obvious reason why it hasn't is that it challenges the audience more than sticking to one genre and genre-shift would tend to take the audience "out" of the film in similar way that breaking the fourth-wall does.

But it would be highly original and cool to see done.

Any films you know of that do anything like this, other than Natural Born Killers?

From Dusk Till Dawn?
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0116367/

[Liam Hall]

OK. It's morning. I've thought about it now.

Save your money, it's not worth catching COVID to go see this film. Probably Nolan's worst effort.

Too many lazy tropes (nasty Russian billionaire, winsome but weak wife, gentlemen's club with rude staff). Too much exposition. A central premise that relies on whacky physics. Too many needless characters. Clunky plot. Clunky character arcs. Clunky...

The core problem is you need to concentrate to understand and buy into the World Nolan is creating but in engaging your brain so strongly you notice all the faults with the concept, the characters and the plot, of which there are many.

Scratch below the surface and there is nothing.

It thinks it's a clever film. It's not.

[Batutta]

Save your money, it's not worth catching COVID to go see this film. Probably Nolan's worst effort.

I liked it more than Dunkirk. I found Dunkirk characterless and devoid of human interests. Tenet at least had a single protagonist I cared about following through the narrative. I'd rank them--

Dark Knight
Memento
The Prestige
Batman Begins
Inception
Interstellar
Dark Knight Rises
Tenet
Insomnia
Dunkirk

I haven't watched Following.