"Tenet" Review - From the Vaults

 "TENET"

An unnamed agent (literally referred to in universe as "Protagonist"), played by John David Washington, joins a secretive organisation to respond to a time-travel based plot to end the world, all hinging on a Russian oligarch (Kenneth Branagh) who may be able to speak to the future.

There you go, I've given you in one sentence what the movie takes 2 and 1/2 hours to not tell us.

"TENET" is a movie of impressive set pieces (there is a fantastic opening sequence in an opera house, and a fun car chase among others) and a plot to be dissected for years to come; what we now expect from a Nolan movie.

But it's a soulless affair.

John David Washington is given nothing to work with, and the script is exposition throughout. Three separate characters say some variation of "are you confused? Don't worry" and of our main cast (John David Washington, Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, Kenneth Branagh and Dimple Kapadia) only one clearly had their name said: Neil (Robert Pattison) and he is the best character. 

Don't get me wrong, this is an impressive movie and it flies by, but it is a cold and rather empty affair when compared to his previous works: remember how in "Inception" we knew in the first twenty minutes what the goal was, who Cobb was and why he needed to do it? And we had his team somewhat characterised? (Arthur was the smooth right hand man, Ariadne was the newbie surrogate, Saito the pimp daddy Watanabe, Eames the camp con man etc) Well here that's not really there in the same way. 

It flies straight into it and doesn't really let up, with the aforementioned set pieces, and the two and a half hours flew by, but I found it lacking. Other viewings will DEFINITELY reveal more.

Oh, and the sound mixing is fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucked.

But who gives a shit about sound mixing?

Nobody.

So imagine how shit it is that I am noticing it.

Film's a solid 7/10.