TENET

K-16 | 2h 30min | August 26, 2020 (Finland)

SPOILER-FREE: Now as we are allowed to visit movie theaters again – with restrictions – all you’d need are movies worth to watch… and I had been looking forward to watch this one for a while, avoiding trailers, other infos etc just to make sure I’ll be fully surprised. This is also the reason why I was not aware of its length… “welcome to the new 2,5 h Christopher Nolan movie” – errr, what? Hopefully it won’t be a boring …

Well, you don’t need to fear boredom – I felt thrilled and excited all the way through. First, the TENET story is captivating – WW 3 needs to be prevented. A story from a writer/director known for Interstellar, Memento, Dark Night and Inception – high quality can be expected. Secondly, the duo John David Washington and Robert Pattinson has action star powers which I honestly didn’t expect. J.D. Washington, Denzel’s son, has shown his quality in BlackKlansmen and Mr. Pattinson has – in my opinion – now finally ditched his vampire teeth for good. There’s also some Bond movie flair incl. dry humor – it’s about the twilight world of international espionage and arms dealers; gripping action scenes – I even enjoyed the thrill of the car chase which otherwise I find a very boring US movie cliche. Then this surreal fascination scenes that had my jaw drop (enhanced by score and effects) – plus this mind boggling concept of time travel. Here Science and Fiction are kept in a nice balance, the basic concept sounds plausible so that you really enjoy getting into the plot development. Which means it’s not pure Popcorn cinema but also something to ponder over… It’s only Elizabeth Debicki’s role that I found too cliché first – yet this improved as the story went along, so was this an intentional mislead in the story line?

Well, the story line … I assume that many will afterwards try to get the DVD to study this movie in more detail, or watch it again on the big screen once more, at least. When I walked out it felt I haven’t fully grasped the complexity of it all yet – just like after watching Interstellar.

And that’s all I can say here – my attempt of a summary would look like this

Summing up, I can only recommend this one.