Tenet

 

Tenet (Amazon Prime)                                                                                   December  16, 2020

How do I begin? Tenet is a complex and confusing movie. Christopher Nolan’s movies such as Inception and Interstellar have intricate and challenging plots. Tenet is on a whole other level. It is sci-fi bent on itself. Nolan has been gestating this project for twenty years. There is an opening scene in Memento (2000) which is a precursor for Tenet. Time flows from the past to the future and back. As time rewinds you see people walking backwards and objects reversing themselves such as a bullet going back into the barrel of a gun. In some scenes the same characters appear as present and future versions of themselves. They use the word entropy a lot but I have no idea what it means (I was a history major). When you Google Tenet one of the choices is Tenet explained.

The title Tenet is a palindrome and is a metaphor for the fluidity of time. The title is derived from a Sator Square containing a five-word Latin palindrome with Tenet in the middle. The plot, plots, involve the CIA, a Russian oligarch, an Indian arms trafficker, an unwitting art expert, climate change and the end of the world.

Tenet was supposed to be the blockbuster of the year. Like other movies it was derailed by the Covid virus. The movie cost about  $350m (including marketing).Warner Brothers expects to loss about $50m, much because of delayed theater releases in the United States. Rotten Tomatoes gave the film a rating of 71%.  

John David Washington (Black Klansman, Denzel’s son) plays the title role. He is the protagonist  and his name in the movie is the Protagonist. The man swaggers while sitting down. He is the ultimate CIA agent, resourceful and fearless. He does yeoman’s work, but no awards here.

The femme fatal is Elizabeth Debicki, she is married to the Russian oligarch. I do not know much about her but she is 6’ 2” and has a prominent jaw line. She is very English and willowy. She has an unhappy marriage to oligarch and he blackmails her by controlling access to her son.

The villain is played by Kenneth Branagh as Andrei Sator (remember the Sator Square). When I think of Branagh I think of a classically trained Shakespearean actor or as professor Gilderoy Lockhart in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, but not an evil Russian villain (if they wanted evil they should have cast Harvey Keitel). I think he over acts a bit by being what he is not. His pronounced Russian accent is the most menacing thing about him.

Robert Patterson plays Neil the Protagonist’s handler. They make a good team and are together for a large part of the movie. This is a bit of a departure from his Twilight series, but he has bulked up a bit and is less dewy eyed.

The international arms dealer is played by Dimple Kapadia as Priya. She only a few scenes but is a lynch pin. She is an attractive woman of a certain age and plays her role as an adroit ruthless weapons dealer. Love her name.

Michael Caine has a brief role as a British intelligence officer. It is the wittiest part of the movie and worthy of a chuckle.

The movie is filmed in various locations around the world and there are some impressive stunts. There is no sex in the movie, none, nada, zippo!

The film is on  Amazon Prime for $19.99. I saw it twice, had to. Use subtitles, the sound mix is poor.