Tenet

This year has not gone the way we planned at all and I honestly didn't think we would get any new theatrically released films this year. However now cinemas are open, I went yesterday for the first time in six months to see Tenet and it was a great experience.

Without question, the best thing about this film is you can feel it's a Christopher Nolan film literally as soon as it starts. With the camera looming over a certain area and when that score starts to play, you feel Christopher Nolans mark on the film and you feel his ambitious and powerful direction throughout the film.

What I also really liked about the film was his execution of the concept. Because of all the secrecy of the films story, I'm gonna be respectful towards it and not reveal any spoilers or at least try not to. But what I will say is he finds a way to execute the concept with it realistically embodied in the real world and without it looking extremely cartoonish. Christopher Nolan is very good at taking concepts like this films one and transforming them into big movie blockbusters. It feels like he's the only director in this world who can do that and that makes me excited for his future films.

And as this is a Christopher Nolan film, you've got to talk about the cast and once again, he's got a very strong cast on him. John David Washington is proving to be a real chip off the old block in regards his father and a real rising star. I really enjoyed his performance in Blackkklansman and he gives a fantastic performance in this film. Its really nice to see Robert Pattinson return to more worldwide films since he's been doing more indie films since his twilight days but he's also great in this film. Elizabeth Debecki and Kenneth branagh also give great performances as well.

There's also some really great sequences and stunt work in this film. Once again, I'm not going to give any details but the stunts we see are very Christopher Nolan-esque and it's hard to tell if they were practical stunts or filmed in a studio. My money would go on the former.

And finally, the visual effects are just incredible. Everything that happened in this film looked so believable and it's really hard to imagine how this film was made without any special effects. Its one of those situations where you think "making this film must have been so boring in compared to watching it" and I say that as a really good thing.

Onto the mixed aspect in the film, it's actually in regards of Michael Caines addition. It's nice to see him in appear in films but whilst he had a good screen presence in this film, he's not in it much at all. In fact, he's only in it for one scene and by the end of the film, you actually forget he was in it so it makes me wonder if it would affect the plot if you cut him out of the film.

Another mixed aspect are the action scenes; now at times they are very were crafted, staged and well choreographed but there's times where they look really odd or they're edited quite choppily.

Now onto the negatives; now before I go on any further, I just want to say I am not saying there's anything wrong with this film or Christopher Nolan does anything wrong. I am just talking about how I felt about my experience with this film. Whilst I enjoyed the concept and the execution, watching this film ended feeling like a chore because the entire time, I kept wondering what the story was. And that was the big problem for me. This film can get extremely confusing at times and that is due to the fact I struggled to understand the main story. Even when the concept of Tenet is being explained, I had trouble processing what was being said.

Now there's times where I was on board and following the film quite well but very quickly, it became very confusing again and that stopped me enjoying the film all the way through. This is a film where I think I'll need to rewatch it but maybe with someone else so I can see what they think and they can help me out if I'm having trouble following it.

Also now this is a bit of a nitpick but it bothered me that John David Washingtons character didn't have a name. It confused me when I saw he was just credited as the protagonist and I wondered maybe there was a reason why his name hasn't been revealed. And by the end of the film, he had no name and I just felt it was very odd. Especially when during the film, several people ask his name and he shrugs it off by changing the topic.

Overall, this is a well crafted, visually stunning and ambitious film which is not necessarily Christopher Nolans best but it's still an impressive, well made film that I wish I enjoyed me if I didn't spend the entire time being confused.

⭐⭐⭐⭐