Tenet (2020) - Christoper Nolan

The only aspect that alludes me is when a linear self is inverted and sequestered. Does that linear self also age inverted? If not; I'm struggling how information can be passed down to generations previous or how the turnstiles come into being in the past or is it hinted that the turn-stile mechanisms can be inverted, perhaps during the incident in Siberia?!

Definitely going for another viewing next week.

e; so it seems information was passed down through time capsules, buried in the future. I recall the scene now where a gold bar is passed to the protagonist as payment for the heist. Still boggling at an item buried in the future, would continue to stay buried when inverted, as opposed to the burial simply being reversed and the time capsule being dismantled.

However, the comments by Neil suggest he must have been inverted for weeks / months / years which would suggest he was either recruited as a 20-something, assuming a linear self ages normally when inverted or as a 40-something?
 
Last edited:
I'm 25 mins out of the cinema and still playing catch-up. Ffs that was exhausting.

In a good way mind, got me tearing my hair out trying figure things out.
 
I just read the last few pages and I am glad to know that I'm not slowly going deaf and it was the music in the film being too loud. It is a great sound track though.
This is one of the few films that i wanted to rewatch immediately.
I'm curious how many things i missed at the beginning of the film.

Edit: Whoops, used quotes rather than spoiler tags
 
Last edited:
I just got home from seeing Tenet. As several have said before, I really need to see it again to get my head around it. The dialogue was a bit off at times but I put it down to the actual environments they were in during those scenes and wearing masks etc. I did like the movie though, but it's a bit heavy for my brain (specially post night shifts).
 
Just came out and I definitely need to see this at home with subs. It wasn’t an imax viewing so no deaf ears but the dialogue was mixed way too low vs the rest of the movie.

For those worried about social distancing and covid, I went for a 8pm viewing at the camden Odeon and there was only 6 people in my viewing. Thats on a monday bank holiday too.
 
Last edited:
^ Like-wise on Saturday at 2pm in the PictureHouse Soho; there were about ~30 people in the screening. Every person / couple / family were in an island with 12 empty seats around each grouping.

I'm sure the audio mix is by directorial design; a Nolan signature.
The soundtrack / sound-stage was phenomenal and this was at a 2d non-imax screening.
 
I really didn't enjoy it one iota. Seemed like a glorified tech demo with a plot thrown in and some pretty iffy acting. I could not find anything to enjoy about it and the ending in the cave was just a mess. I'm sure lots of people will say I'm wrong, and you need to watch it x number of times, or I'm not clever enough. But I just didn't find it entertaining at all.
So yeah, disappointed, but I have been with Nolan's output since Dark Knight Rises.
 
Can anyone clarify these points for me?

As I understand it, Kenneth Branaughs character happened to be in the right place, at the right time in a vague Russian city which has some sort of nuclear disaster. People from the future buried some inverted time capsule so they could contact him, give him plans to make inverters etc etc. That allowed him to become wealthy.

The future people's 'endgame' was to wipe out humans in the past, so they didn't use all the planets resources and would themselves be able to survive....they were desperate, so they were hoping wiping out people from the past wouldn't kill them?

At some point, the "good guys" at 'Tenet' get hold of inverted artifacts from crime scenes or whatever, and at some point get hold of the same plans so they themselves can make inverters?

I didn't quite get the inverted bullets demonstration. When Clemence Posey was showing Washington the inverted gun - Did somebody at Tenet previously fire a normal gun in to the wall and then put it through an inverter so it would then 'catch' bullets it had previously fired? But if that's the case, the bullets themselves wouldn't be inverted would they?
 
Last edited:
VincentHanna said:
Can anyone clarify these points for me?

As I understand it, Kenneth Branaughs character happened to be in the right place, at the right time in a vague Russian city which has some sort of nuclear disaster. People from the future buried some inverted time capsule so they could contact him, give him plans to make inverters etc etc. That allowed him to become wealthy.

The future people's 'endgame' was to wipe out humans in the past, so they didn't use all the planets resources and would themselves be able to survive....they were desperate, so they were hoping wiping out people from the past wouldn't kill them?

At some point, the "good guys" at 'Tenet' get hold of inverted artifacts from crime scenes or whatever, and at some point get hold of the same plans so they themselves can make inverters?

I didn't quite get the inverted bullets demonstration. When Clemence Posey was showing Washington the inverted gun - Did somebody at Tenet previously fire a normal gun in to the wall and then put it through an inverter so it would then 'catch' bullets it had previously fired? But if that's the case, the bullets themselves wouldn't be inverted would they?
Click to expand...

THat's how I understood Sator - I did wonder if the "nuclear disaster" was actually some sort of inversion event. The past didn't specifically seek him out, he just happened to be there.

The future plan was to use the algorithim to reverse the flow of time - not just for one person, but for everything. Presumably they were hoping that time would then flow from them forwards, wiping out the past, but avoiding the grandfather paradox. I think it's pretty clear they have no idea, but that the future is so awful they might as well try.

The good guys capture the inverter where Kat gets shot - I assumed their inversions start from there? Later they capture the ones in Russia, so could presumably loop back from there.

The inverted bullets demonstration - my best guess on this is that the bullet was fired by an inverted soldier - the wall looks similar to the buildings of the end fight. That means in the past it's already embedded in the wall, as it's moving backwards. Protagonist is able to catch the bullet out of the wall by applying forward entropy to the inverted bullet. Maybe? It did seem like the "inverted bullets" trading thing was actually a lack of understanding by Tenet about what was actually happening, as they had only seen the inverted objects, not the inverted people.
 
It was a good-ish script idea executed really badly but very stylishly and on big budget. Plot execution was so shoddily paced it felt like a TV series shortened to a movie.

Almost everything of importance at the beginning happens so fast and is so poorly delivered among Nolan's ear piercing "dongs" and "zooms" that you do have to watch it twice to barely understand pre-premise and setup. Everything that happens afterwards is just machine gunned across the audience. Characters go to places, often go straight into n-th floors, meet people, discuss "stuff", get upset, get violent, get attached to other characters and we? We don't know why. We are passive observer of all the weird and unexplained stuff that happens with literally two sentences thrown into terrible audio mix every now and then and we try to follow. It's like we only got shown every 10th page of this script.

So I'm just going to say it - it's a beautifully shot, professionally delivered, embraced in all the stylish "waggadong" and "hashooomz" surround sound thingymadgiggy's mess - if it didn't have Nolan's name attached to it, it would be one of hundred straight to streaming "near future" sci-fi-sh movies almost no one remembers. Just wait until someone comes up that it's a mess on purpose to underline inevitability and passiveness of events in time.
 
Saw it yesterday in the Notts Showcase Xplus

Tbh, I didn't find it that confusing from the time dilation aspects, and guessed the "twists" straight away. But as feared, missed so much dialogue some aspects of the actual plot evaded me.

At home with subtitles will be the next watch for me.
 
Yea I saw it on Sunday, I definitely want to watch it again with subtitles to see if I missed anything important.

Other than the crazy pace at the start of the film, I was doing fine with it up until he shot her with an inverted bullet, after that it all got a bit chaotic!

Her going back in time to the boat, was that the first time we had seen someone go back in time? Everyone else had 'inverted' and needed breathing equipment, no? I probably missed something.
 
No, what they did was use the carousel in the other vault to un-invert themselves back to normal

Edit: In fact it would have been the one on the boat at the point
 
Last edited:
Sui said:
Other than the crazy pace at the start of the film, I was doing fine with it up until he shot her with an inverted bullet, after that it all got a bit chaotic!

Her going back in time to the boat, was that the first time we had seen someone go back in time? Everyone else had 'inverted' and needed breathing equipment, no? I probably missed something.
Click to expand...

She'd already re-inverted again by that point so was going forward in time. They just didn't show it happen as far as I can remember.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom