Feeling TENET
“Don’t try to understand it, feel it”. This line may be the most important sentence from writer/director Christopher Nolan’s newest film, TENET. This is not a perfect film, but it is an action film masterpiece that will age like fine wine as time progresses. TENET, the 11th film of Nolan’s, is the most unfiltered Nolan we have seen yet. His approach to this film was bombastic and bold; taking risks and making artistic choices that are both unapproachable and exhilarating. But this is a film made to be upper case, Cinema and it requires submission and acceptance to not try and understand it as it’s playing out, but to just connect and feel the film. As I walked out of the theatre for the first time in nine months, I couldn’t help but smile. TENET, my most anticipated film of this year, left me in wonder, amazement, and glee filled.
In every film, there are flaws and missteps, TENET is no different and is a genuinely complicated film that on first viewing will most likely leave large percentages of the audience confused and annoyed. Much like Inception or Interstellar however, TENET is a film that provides all the answers necessary, it just takes concentration to find them all. But unlike Inception and Interstellar, TENET is playing the role of a James Bond but more accurately a Mission Impossible film. Following the footsteps of the MI series gave Nolan the opportunity to make the action the driving force of the story rather than the story and exposition. Character takes a backseat in TENET in favor of awe inducing spectacle. It’s a choice that I think pays off for this film which is already a near overload of senses and a clear recognition of what the film is trying to be.
“Being a great filmmaker and dealing with a big subject, and bringing Warner Brothers alongside him. In the exact way Stanley Kubrick would have done, bringing Warner Brothers along the way.”
The comparison between Stanley Kubrick and Christopher Nolan has been around for at least a decade now, the result of both Nolan himself and the film community, and never has that felt more accurate than now. In the words of Quentin Tarantino, “Being a great filmmaker and dealing with a big subject, and bringing Warner Brothers alongside him. In the exact way Stanley Kubrick would have done, bringing Warner Brothers along the way.” Nolan has taken many nods of inspiration from Kubrick, from his commitment to the preservation of film, a true prioritization of practical effects, long-form complex narratives, and of course creating Interstellar, Nolan’s version of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Nolan took risks with his stylization of Tenet and what emphasis he placed on different story telling tools. For some, these risks and choices will tarnish their enjoyment of the film and be too strong of a turn off, much in same way 2001: A Space Odyssey can turn off viewers with its minutes long segments spent screeching at the audience accompanied by slow steady cam shots, Nolan’s deliberate choice to mix the film with the dialogue at the bottom will infuriate and drive away viewers. While there’s an understandable discomfort in the mixing of TENET, there is great beauty in artists shattering the norms of film creation and consumption to greater emphasize what the film is trying to accomplish.
“Many of the filmmakers I’ve admired over the years have used sound in bold and adventurous way. I don’t agree with the idea that you can only achieve clarity through dialogue. Clarity of story, clarity of emotions — I try to achieve that in a very layered way using all the different things at my disposal — picture and sound.”
TENET is the third film since Nolan began treating sound as a tool to be manipulated with just as much as the camera work, acting, lighting, and script. Starting with Interstellar, Nolan changed his sound mixing approach and began to allow his multi dimensional scores and sound design take up more influence in the story telling. Rather than just relying on dialogue, Nolan bought in hard on the concept of “show, don’t tell”, telling The Hollywood Reporter, “Many of the filmmakers I’ve admired over the years have used sound in bold and adventurous way. I don’t agree with the idea that you can only achieve clarity through dialogue. Clarity of story, clarity of emotions — I try to achieve that in a very layered way using all the different things at my disposal — picture and sound.”
With an eye for visual storytelling that’s unlike any other filmmaker working today, Nolan took that concept to an even higher level with Dunkirk, a nearly silent film in regards to dialogue. Dunkirk is perhaps Nolan’s best piece of art. It is filled with great heart and beauty, while not shying away from the terror and helplessness of war. Dunkirk is filled to the brim with unparalleled set pieces that convey story without relying on dialogue. Exposition is shown and articulated with clarity, and heart attack inducing pace is found through the luxury of cutting out expository dialogue. TENET follows a similar vein of not appealing to dialogue to carry the weight of the story telling, and much to many viewers chagrin, Nolan ramps up the truly superb score by Ludwig Goransson high above the dialogue and lets it carry you through the story via music and SFX alone. It’s a truly remarkable experience in IMAX.
Two of the best aspects of this film is easily Ludwig Goransson and Kenneth Branagh. Replacing Hans Zimmer was never going to be easy, but Ludwig took this opportunity and hit a grand slam. The score fits so perfectly with the film that it’s easy to understand why Nolan allows the score to take such a heavy burden of the story telling, something this well written deserves to showcase what it can do.
While Goransson injects new life into the sound of a Nolan film, there are nods to Zimmer’s Dark Knight, Inception, and Interstellar scores that feels like a deserving nod to the legend that is Hans Zimmer. For real, listen to RAINY NIGHT IN TALLINN and TRUCKS IN PLACE definitive bangers, both of them. I hope Ludwig continues to work with Nolan, I would love to see more of this new duo.
(On a side note, the combination of Ludwig, Hiro Murai, and Donald Glover is such an incredible three person artist group, and project they contribute to is elevated by their work and I’m so happy we get to hear Ludwig score a Nolan film. This is Ludwig’s best work so far, and that’s with tremendous respect to everything he’s written before.)
Kenneth Branagh on the other hand is rapidly rising up my rankings of favorite actors in Nolan films. Nolan seems to perfectly understand the strengths of Branagh and writes him roles and scenes that give Branagh unlimited room to chew the scene at a truly absurd rate. Branagh gives it his all with a role that isn’t deeply written, but manages to create this genuinely hateful villain that steals every scene he’s in. Between Branagh’s performance in Dunkirk and TENET, I can safely say that I need this collaboration to continue for as long as possible.
Branagh is honestly fucking unreal in this movie. He’s spitting, he’s kicking, he’s got an accent he’s super committed to and it totally works. Outside of the Joker, this has to be my favorite villain of Nolan films just from Branagh’s performance, it’s SUPERB.
“We all believe we’d run into that burning building, but until we feel the heat, we will never know. You do. You chose to die instead of giving up your collogues. That test you passed, not everybody does.”
John David Washington finally broke the mold of the Christopher Nolan protagonist so hard he actually claimed the name The Protagonist. No, I’m serious his name in the film is just The Protagonist and it’s actually perfect to illustrate what this movie is and is not. The Protagonist doesn’t get a backstory, we don’t learn anything about him or what his real motivations are besides the fact that he is the type of person to run into the metaphorical burning building to help. In an action espionage film where his goal is to save the world, that’s all we need to know: he’s a good person and he’s a badass who will risk it all to help. The Protagonist doesn’t womanize like James Bond or Ethan Hunt, he is there to get the job done and doesn’t want collateral damage. Washington plays it perfectly and oozes charm and confidence while existing as a character who knows very little about that which he is tasked with fixing.
The part where Washington really stands out was his shared commitment to practicality along side Nolan. Washington performed most of the stunt work himself, something quite visible in-camera that creates a feeling of wonder in how they accomplished the set piece. Washington helped tremendously to shore up what was really Nolan’s biggest flaw as an action filmmaker, fighting and choreography. Washington, a former Division I Wide Receiver, showed off great athleticism and enabled Nolan to film the fight scenes in the closest and most powerful way so far in his filmography. There’s a true sense of impact and intensity when The Protagonist has a showdown with three goons in a restaurant kitchen early in the film. It has a sense of rawness that was never this clearly displayed in any of the Batman films.
Robert Pattinson is as always, excellent. He and Washington bounce off each other with great chemistry even with minimal time spent to expanding their friendship through exposition. Pattinson really shines in the second half of the film and gives his absolute A-Game. Without going into spoilers it’s rather difficult to expand upon both Pattinson’s performance and Elizabeth Debicki’s.
Debicki has been a favorite of mine as an actress since her performance in The Night Manager, a role not too dissimilar to her own in TENET. Her performance in Widows is exceptional and it is no different here. She is really carrying a lot of the emotion of the film and whether she’s working off Washington or Branagh, her performance elevates the scenes and creates a wonderful, estranged wife to the villain of classic espionage cinema. It’s not an easy role and she carries her weight effectively.
The rest of the supporting cast is far more brief in their screen time than the top four, but like all Nolan films, they are all on point and the use of hundreds of extras adds to much to the depth in camera. And speaking of in camera, Hoyte Van Hoytema once again proved how talented he is as a cinematographer. Finally with three films under his belt with Nolan, I feel more confident than ever to say that Hoytema has elevated Nolan more than Wally Pfister did before him — no disrespect to Pfister who’s a master of his own. The cinematography is off the charts and so clearly articulates the properties of the time inversion concept. His use of light and the framing with the IMAX cameras is what I love about truly great cinema. These are the Stanley Kubrick films of our time in terms of the use of a camera to film cinema. Very few people can create these shots with the depth and beauty to them that Nolan and Hoytema have managed to create together.
This is going to be a divisive movie for a few years, but I believe that TENET is an action-espionage masterpiece of the 21st century. It’s not perfect, just as every great film ever, but it has such a distinct vision of what it is and it follows that on an inspiringly artful journey. This is the maximum use of the art form, it’s every department firing on all cylinders and an execution of a specific vision that in my honest opinion is just rad as hell.
TENET feels like it could’ve been a vastly different film that was three-and-a-half hours long not two-and-a-half, gave more time for in-between conversation and pushed character development. And while that would’ve been a more fleshed out story, I don’t think it would’ve been a better film. TENET is a required multiple time viewing film if I’ve ever seen one. The first viewing is pure spectacle, the second time is to figure out what happened; and it’s not a bad thing for a film to require more than one viewing to understand and enjoy. Rich art that takes time and effort to digest and understand the vision of the creator is important and immensely valuable.
Do yourself a favor and find a theatre that’s doing things safe and go see TENET. If you don’t like movies being absurdly loud and will be annoyed because you can’t hear the dialogue perfectly, just wait till it gets released for buy or rent so you can watch with subtitles and then enjoy this terrific experience of a film. Just know, don’t go into this film trying to understand, just embrace it, let go of questions, just absorb, feel it.