Rank your fav Nolan films... we're curious! Also don't forget to check out World of Tanks here: tanks.ly/3t2BXlZ and use the code GIJOE21 for in-game perks. Thanks to World of Tanks for sponsoring this video!
i don't think all physics ideas should make philosophical sense case in point : spooky action at a distance or "Quantum entanglement " the "reverser machine" actually makes time of objects effected by consciousness not just reversing how the object is moving back in time but that happens because the observer wants it I don't think you guys actually understand the fact that conciseness effects time in the "movie" and more importantly only effects objects that have been reversed ((because objects have been reversed from the observer point of view)) Don't quote me on any of this i don't claim I'm a "physicist" but that's what happened in the movie "i think"
Tenet in my top 5 Nolans, probably because I have a curious spirit and I don't get exhausted and mean when I get tired of thinking and I don't take it out on the thing I get tired of.. I just figure it out or don't. I usually do and then help ppl along find the stuff they can like when they thought there was stuff that was stopping them from liking things
so today I wasn't just doing my business until I saw this video? I started my day by being ready to write this comment, until the video was finally uploaded?
I didn't know who Pattinson was until someone said its Cullen from Twilight and I was dragged to see that chick flick "Twilight" back then otherwise I would had never known who Pattinson was in my lifetime. In short, more people know Cullen than Pattinson. I honestly wouldn't watch anything with Pattinson as the main interest of a movie.
And now in 2022 as The Batman. I think he has outshined his cringy past and then some.He has been on a slow methodical roll and I cannot wait to see him in what he is in next.
I believe Tenet is meant to be viewed backwards. If you knew the relationship between the protagonist and Neil, Astor’s tragic marriage with Kat, you’d be invested in the characters. But you can’t . So you watch the movie and then are meant to *rewatch* it. Then it hits differently.
Not really, and I wouldn’t call it an “experiment”. This concept has been done before and so so so effectively in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey
Yes. He knew exactly what he was doing when he named his protagonist "Protagonist". And imo, he succeeded, or at least: he did not fail. Both concept and pacing are amazing
@@vidroiualin2060 You need to watch Dark. It is a 3 season long show full of time travel paradoxes without a single plot hole and has really great characters.
I was stupid enough to drive 8 hrs to watch this movie in IMAX DURING A PANDEMIC and honestly I'm glad I did :) it may have been confusing, but experiencing an original mind bending concept w/ a great score was a subtle highlight in a horrible year. I also got a citation on my way to see this movie. The most money I've spent to see a movie. Lol!
Don't care how well reasoned your argument is, I still love this movie! Not a perfectly made film but if you can get on board with the story then it can be a 10/10 viewing experience. Had the biggest "Ohhhh holy shit!" moments when the Protagonist fought himself in the hallway and suddenly everything in the film started to make a lot more sense! Really enjoyed that moment.
Nolan made an entire movie where time moves backwards, with amazing characters and a great first act where literally they show you the end of the film, abd it is amazing. I am speaking of course of Memento.
@@elbaecc I think you misunderstood the ad. When you sign up, you get a bunch of free stuff. You also get some missions you can complete to get additional free stuff. And it's a bit unfair to call World of Tanks a generic game. It's been out for quite a while, and been so successful that they created additional games, like the one with ships and the one with planes. I've tried playing it a few times over the last 6 or 7 years, never had any fun with it. But a lot of people do love it. 5 years ago in college half the computer science people I knew were playing. A lot of the war vets I work with also greatly enjoy the game. I wouldn't really consider it too dodgy. And it's definitely miles better than a Raid Shadow Legends ad
I feel like nolan wanted to show off an exercise in reverse photography on the studio's dime. And this was the bare minimum story he needed to achieve this.
@@wibblewobble3 Some parts were enjoyable and the the time pincer thing was a neat idea, but time travel always breaks down under the lightest scrutiny, so that didn't really help the movie either. It was definitely an ambitious endeavor, I'll give it that.
I loooove puzzle movies and that's why I hate Tenet. There's no puzzle to figure out, just the illusion of a puzzle. It's like doing a jigsaw puzzle where the pieces don't fit
@@FireShell7 no number of watches would explain what either Sador or Protagonist does during the car chase (for example) let alone all the logic errors related to time inversion (most of which exist solely to allow the plot to happen). Such a dumb movie posing as a smart one. I wish it just accepted its dumbness and let it be just the fun ride it is
Yeah I found that quite annoying. And it seemed like there might have been spoilers for other movies as well. I haven't seen Prestige yet and want to without it being spoiled.
"Bad" is definitely not the right word for Tenet. It's obvious that Nolan just wanted to do a movie with backwards action scenes. There isn't much more to the movie than that, and it's not on the level of Nolan's other works, but taken as simple spectacle, it's serviceable. Just because it's not a cinematic masterpiece doesn't mean it's bad.
I’ve watched it 6 times now, couldn’t agree more! Inception was my favorite but I think Tenet now rivals it. I remember watching it the first time and could not stop talking about all the philosophical ideas and mechanics of something this wild.
It gives me goosebumps now that so many theories emerge, niel dies in the end but it's the beginning of the protagonist, and if its a temporal pincers, protagonist is trying to save niel
I really am curious: why do you all watch this movie more than once? This isn’t the first time I read this in the comments and it’s something I can’t understand. I don’t want to sound rude but isn’t it a huge waste of time to watch the same two hour film again and again, over and over - up to six times and more?
@@tessavergissmeinnicht5142 waste of time is an interesting phrase here. What makes watching a movie not a wast of time? Maybe you’re saying, if you watch the same movie over and over, especially if you didn’t like it the first time, you’re losing time in finding great movies. However, I would disagree that movie watching is about finding great movies. To me it’s about finding something in the movie that interests you. I think these guys who watched Tenet multiple times are doing that. I’ve personally watched the Master like 10 times. And I don’t just say the typical, I find new things in it every time. I just love rewatching parts I really enjoy. Maybe every time I watch it I miss out on finding another great movie, but I don’t take it that seriously.
I'm not really sure why it got that much stick, it's not all that hard to make sense of it and poses a lot of interesting questions about fate and free will.
@@santiagobauza4257 It's not the the concept is that hard to wrap your head around. It's that who is doing what for what reason isn't established AT ALL. Like the bad guys are some vague shadow figures from the future that just kind of want to destroy the world. The good guys are good so they want to stop them... It's so bland and dull when you take away the hyped up sci-fi concept of things moving backwards through time. They literally go out of their way to make sure you know that they don't want you to know any details, which is just a complete waste of a good sci-fi concept.
What if Nolan is making a second movie, which reflects the other side of the Temporal Pincer move, which fills in all holes in this movie. Both are needed to understand
Tenet may not be Nolan's best, but saying its "really bad" with a smug face is classic youtube video essay hyperbole bullshit, and I think everyone expects better from this channel.
But it is objectively bad. No one's hating you for enjoying it but it was poorly edited, the sound mixing was bad, the script was lazy, and there was no emotion or character.
I'm so happy that video's like TeneT are made even though a lot of people don't get it. They can watch all kinds of other (Hollywood's) movies explaining all in the movie itself by an actor or narrator and do not require any intelligence what so ever to digest it. Just be numbly entertained. Great choices everywhere!
Watching this made me realize: I like the concept/idea of fighting villains going backwards in time (plot) more than I like the overall movie. The choreography and some of the big reveals were amazing when it all clicked. But I'm couldnt relate/love many of the characters in the movie. By the time you gain interest in many the movie is wrapping up. Maybe it's due to that final premise when Neil says this was the end but the protagonist starts. The intro to his arch/story. A concept that starts/begins at the ends. A trilogy series that must to understand the value of the 1st film. But then again a tenant of movies are that each individual movie should be able to stand alone.
I loved it. Easily one of Top 5 Chris Nolan films for me. It challenges you and demand you to understand the story on an absolutely different basis in comparison to 99% of Hollywood films. After every rewatch, Tenet just gets better, deeper and more fascinating to me.
Kind of lost faith in this reviewer the moment he said the Tenet hand gesture was the dumbest secret handshake. The meeting of the opposing hands and interlacing of the fingers is a perfect symbol of the movies forwards and backwards timelines existing in the same moment. How could he miss that?
I'm so tired of critics telling me that movies need relatable characters to be good. That is not true, and (for me) never has been. Characters can be mere vehicles to move the spectacle forward. That is what Nolan was doing with the Protagonist. Wisecrack hints at this, but I don't think you really get it.
Trying to stop ww3 isn’t enough for you to invest in? They also added a woman fighting for her son and most likely rising to be the head of the organization that tries to stop this war? Still not enough? Do you go on about character development in regular war movies?
Not setting up your protagonist was the point, it's the idea that he had to do what he needed without prompting him. Like dr strange not telling tony until moments before you know. In tenets case the audience was supposed to ride along without perception. So reverse inception?? IDK
But, it’s a spy movie. With the exception of Daniel Craig’s Bond, in a spy movie, the audience goes all the way through the 3rd act without knowing anything about the super-spy protagonist’s back story.
@Pranav M Well, let me be more specific: The Bond series except for Daniel Craig. The audience is given the same amount of knowledge about Bond’s past, and it’s been that way for decades. And besides, in Tenet, we do get a sense of The Protagonist’s moral compass. He is deeply concerned about the welfare of his crew, so much so that he sheds tears for them and is willing to die before ratting them out and getting them killed. He also has a heart for people’s welfare in general. In the planning of the plane heist, he’s concerned about not hurting civilians. So, why can’t you, Pranav, root for him? Maybe your mind was busy with the numerous machinations of the plot/rules of the world building and when they’re laid out? Where you concerned about the sound?
@@d3j4v00 It’s true that we never get his name, but so what? And his feelings about each situation he was in were pretty apparent to me. He just faced each problem with this glib super-confident attitude kinda like, well, James Bond. That’s what I think Nolan was going for, but it seems like you didn’t see it that way
@@JustinRevis I did see the glib super confidence but it didn't turn into a character flaw like it does for Bond. The more I learn about bond the longer his odds seem, the more I am impressed and relieved when his confidence pays off. The more I learn about the Protagonist the more I realize he's already won and there's nothing he can do but go through the necessary motions. Bond is overconfident and messy but lucky enough to make up for it and the stakes are high enough that the ends justify the mess. With this guy I think he's going to be like that but no, his glib overconfidence is met by plot armor, we find out in the airport that he's already won. He has more and more capable supporting characters appear out of nowhere as the movie processes at the perfect time. The stakes are life and death at the beging and lower through out the runtime. By the end the protagonist is not a flawed hero who overcame but a Syssiphus who is damned to live out his days orchestrating an operation that already happened.
@Pranav M Again, you’re talking about Daniel Craig’s Bond which is the most emotional Bond of them all. Of course we feel what he feels. His emotions are far more apparent than his predecessors, so we feel his pain. Have you ever watched Sean Connery’s Bond? He has the same level of confidence. I guess he was more of icon of success generation. A wish fulfillment fantasy for young men of the time to place themselves in. He didn’t need to have so much depth. Now perhaps, in Tenet, we have the Protagonist to be a kind of “wish fulfillment fantasy” for young black men? Up until now, I’ve hardly ever seen that kind of success in hands of a black man on screen; not without them being drug dealer or sports star, but I digress. I certainly DO NOT want to tell you how to feel. I just want to present to you what the Writer was going for, and how it worked for me. :)
watch the "closer look" regarding tenet as tenet acording to nolan is a study for screenwriters to learn how a film with a complex plot can't always make a film good as the audience only truly connects to characters and their emotions through their emotional jounrey
REPORTER: You've just released a new movie with the title of "Tenet". Can you briefly tell us what is this all about? NOLAN: It's about the protagonist... REPORTER: Who is the protagonist? NOLAN: That's him.
All true what you said. I still like the movie. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ It was really chaotic, and I didn't understand what was going on the whole time. When I left the cinema was the moment the film got into my mind. I thought the whole way home about what future generations will think about us. What prize the future pays for our carelessness? Can we save humanity from a harder life on this planet? I read a review that drew parallels with Interstellar later. Asking similar questions. So the hour after I left the cinema was the value I gained from it. And I want to rewatch it. Something I can not say about Inception.
Answer to the question posed by the video title - "Nothing went wrong." I mean, if people don't know what a Christopher Nolan movie is by this point, then there's not much one can do about that. (Or he just might not be for you, which is totally fine. Different strokes for different folks). The first time I watched it, there were questions floating around in my head, but because I know who's telling the story I know it'll all come together by the end - like all of his puzzles/movies. I felt like most of the criticism I read about it were people saying they were lost and it didn't make sense, and I just didn't get that at all. Watch it again, after you know what's happening and you'll be more impressed (if you weren't already). Each subsequent viewing gets better and better, but I'll admit it's the Nolan-iest Christopher Nolan movie ever, and I'm here for it.
Tenet has a 70% rotten tomato score, a 7.5 on IMDb and has 2 Oscar noms for visuals and production design. While it’s not the best Nolan film calling it “really bad” is definitely a stretch.
It has really good aspects but as a film it's not fun to watch, there's very little to enjoy past the visuals and fight scenes, the concept is cool but half the movie is exposition
Tenet is so complex and interesting movie. It invites you to watch it several times to understand characters motives (just like memento). Not because a movie is complex and difficult to understand is a bad movie. Tenet is mean to be a cult classic. I just love it. BTW. If you watch it more than once, you will understand characters in a better way.
On first watch in the theatre I loved it, but I had some questions like: wasn't there a thing with a painting? But on second viewing it became my favourite film.
A PSA to UA-cam film critics: Just because something didn't follow the structure or "rules" that your sophomore film studies class prof said all films should follow doesn't mean it's bad.
if the characters, dialogue and story are bad, then the film is bad. this video does a pretty good job explaining the structural problems that leads to the movie being worse than it had potential to be. it only takes a few tweaks at the foundations to change a great movie into a bad one, and vice versa.
He points that out in the video. Nolan wanted a clean state protagonist that would learn what was going on and experience the world at a similar rate to the viewer. The issue that myself and many others have is that the move is more of a thought experiment than a movie. I would've gotten the same enjoyment had I been sent a document explaining the rules of the worlds and some hypothetical situations to consider. Overall most of the movie itself was just "fine".
But they don't even explain any details about the world. Just that there is this cool sci-fi time reversal concept in this world. Who are the bad guys exactly ? Who are the good guys exactly ? Why are people motivated to fight on which side when nothing is explained.. No one has any idea why they are doing what or on what side they are truly fighting for. It's just ''they want to end the world and we want to stop them''.. The who, what & why is never established.. Just the how is established. That isn't world building, that's obsessing over a sci-fi concept at the detriment of literally everything else. Which is fine, but lets not pretend this is masterpiece of world building.
For me I watched it, didn't understand it, but loved it. I kinda wanna leave it at that, but I find myself going back to watch it again. Its different but genius.
Leave it at that! There's nothing to understand. If I could go back in time and stop myself from both thinking about the movie and watching it a second time, I would. Then I might still like it a bit. It's best enjoyed as a visceral ride through a confusing landscape
@@razorwireclouds5708 Fuck that. I spent far more effort trying to make out what the characters were saying than understanding the plot. I had to use the scenes that followed conversations as context clues as to the jist of what said conversations had probably been about.
@@razorwireclouds5708 Most of them? Ones held in gasmasks, in the midst of trains going by or the static of seaspray of course, but even conversations held in quieter environments had "whats", "hows" and/or "whys" that went by unintelligibly.
@@xVancha Weird. I had no such issues. Did you see it in a cinema? Could be the theater's speakers being shitty. I saw it at home because if COVID, so I heard pretty much everything pretty clearly on my home speakers.
A film that does not fall within your extremely limited description of what a film and its elements should be does not fail. You simply don't quite grasp it, and not in the sense that it's complicated. It's just not a typical three acter. Tenet properly experiments with the rules of writing for film and most of the odd choices make sense in a way we haven't seen in a long time. Think Lynch, von Trier, or Tarkovsky. Your searching, grasping experience of watching the film makes you part of it. If you fail to notice/grasp these subtleties, you critisism falls dead. If you disengage and get yourself worked up about how the first act does not give what you think you're entitled to and completely miss how much respect you are being given as an audience member... well maybe just rewatch what you know you like? Tenet is radically different from Nolan's previous films and it will go down in history as pivotal in his career. He has put the people who want more of the same on notice. Stay awake or find a new favorite. I haven't had an engaging film experience like this in a long time. What happened? You guys are usually very much on point.
Um. The Protagonist's character was awesome because he had no real perceivable self, believed in doing good at any cost, and thought what he did brought him closer to his destiny which he saw as being a good person for the sake of being good (thus fulfilling ideal destiny). If I saw it in a Disney movie I would hate it for sure, but in this movie, it was even more engrossing and not cheesy because until the end there weren't so many "You are The One" moments. The mechanics were basic brain candy that I enjoyed, and the ending "You masterminded this" moments were predictable, but despite that, I enjoyed it and would definitely be happy to recommend it to anyone that wants a big-screen film for any given night. I didn't like how lambasting the audio was when trying to decipher dialogue sometimes. Maybe that was just the theater I was in.
I thought it was lit, but I'm also a sucker for Nolan films and time travel. Sound mixing was a bit messy, but I thought the story made perfect sense as long as you pay attention.
Personally, I liked. I don't require movies to follow the big Hollywood 3 act structure - I like when filmmakers and novelists experiment with stories and how to tell them. One thought though - there is the possibility that when the protagonist takes the cyanide pill, he does kill himself, and the rest of the story is some sort of death dream where he gets to be THE PROTAGONIST in his own story.
I'm glad people are FINALLY realizing that Nolan is an alien robot who only thinks of humans as motivation for cool scenes & cinematic tricks. But hey, at least we now know love "transcends dimensions of space & time." 👽🤖
Watched it today, and I define it as follows: great director, great cinematography, great acting, great locations, great action setpieces, great wardrobe, great soundtrack, just not engaging.
I really think wisecracks missed the mark on this one. You get the satisfaction when you watch the movie a second time. There is great characterization but you need to dig a little
I think it was fun to find out about the loop. I was intrigued by the time moving backwards and stuff. the world itself was enigmatic enough for me to be interested. but you're right, the characters were sacrificed
The only persisting thought I had during Tenet, aside from how I couldn't understand 90% of the dialogue because the sound mixing was atrocious, was how they filmed John David Washington fighting his inverted self. That was particularly cool, and I wanna know how they did that. Everything else was forgettable.
I think you missed the movie for the plot. Nolan is venturing out of his Jungian, corporate style, and leaning into southern gothic in this one, head on.
What went wrong with Tenet......THE FUCKING AUDIO!!! IDK WTF Nolan was thinking but whatever he had up his ass to mix down the audio the way he did made it entirely unwatchable. Because you know what I love doing while watching a movie? Constantly adjusting the volume...... I was okay with the complex time warping storyline, thats what made it interesting. Its the mix that forces me to constantly have my hand on the volume control, or constantly messing with the EQ, to make it sound decent and/or not wake up the neighborhood. Tenets mix is hot garbage, period.
God I really wanted to love Tenet. I watched it a few times and analyzed sequences, HOPING it would grow on me. It has lots to love, but there's just so much getting in the way. From the inconsistent internal logic (ex. nothing about catching inverted bullets makes sense, that shooting range being a prime example), To the odd direction (there is barely a shot of the army they're fighting in Stalsk-12, it's 10 minutes of them running and shooting at... something), To the strange creative choices like not naming the protagonist (fans will be calling him 'TP' for the rest of time, Chris, hope you're happy), to the sound mixing that only hardcore fanboys defend. Don't get me started one the unappealing villain. I suspect that the screenplay suffers from Jonathan Nolan's absence who has a much better feel for screenwriting.
I feel like Nolan was trying to make the Tenet, the organization in the movie, a character in itself (similar to how Gotham is kind of a character in the Dark Knight trilogy. The organization cannot be fully understood the first time watching the movie, because that wouldn't be a character arc. But if you go back and understand the character arc it ends up being very satisfying. I wasn't able to fully get it the first time while watching the 3rd act, but it's possible.
Nope, you missed this one. Tenet ain't a secret genius, it's a complete genius. You just have to see it more than once to understand, that's all. If you can't do that, then there's nothing more I can say. It's a gem of a movie, and those of us who could understand the film absolutely loved it.
The only thing that actually sucks about this movie is the sound mixing. They screwed the pooch on that one. It's impossible without subtitles. If they made a remastered edition where they fix that, it would be an excellent film.
3:06 He shouldn't be able to do that, that makes no sense. The object is dead, it's in resting mode, it has no will of it's own. The protagonist is acting forwards in time. The act of him catching the thing, implies that he had dropped the thing in the future, but that doesn't make sense. He isn't an inverted person. You either do things forward or backwards in time. This implies we all actually impact the world both forwards and backwards in time all the time, which is just stupid and makes everything unnecessarily complicated.
I couldn't even get an hour into this movie. I like movies like Momento. But this movie starts with the scene after scene of non-stop monotone talking, with each starting and stopping so fast, that they just all seemed to blend into one long non-stop one. It felt like the kind of episode recap you get right before the finale of a long running show, rather than the show itself.
It's funny you used James Bond as a faceless protagonist cause I figured out like 20 mins in to the film it was a gonna be a James Bond film because of that I really enjoyed it.
Christopher Nolan has made no secret of his love for classic James Bond movies and how they’ve been a big influence on his work from the mountain scenes in Inception to the plane hijack in Dark Knight Rises.
I didnt like Tenet at first but each time I watched it I love it more and more. Unlike most movies, like MCU, I keep wanting to go back to find more stuff. It's not a conventional movie and that's one the things that makes it so great.
What's funny about TENET detractors is that they cringe at things such as handshakes from the officer in the first act or lines like "Including my son" while at the same time complain saying things like "I need emotional arcs for these characters" or "these characters lack of emotional depth"... lol
"including my son" is like young darth vader complaining he hates sand. Like, okay, sure, it's motivated by character and emotion just handled clumsily. and anakin had better dialog. and i could hear it in the audio mix.
@@rebeccakeller4666 I understand the line was cringe to some (or most) because was badly delivered, but it makes total sense being Neil in the room taking care of her. So yeah.
It seems to me that writers and directors are creating content based on the availability of technology and future technologies. So if a budget is cut, the staff has to modify expectations/story/plot, basically gutting the plot because technically they can’t do it anymore.
You're not. Many people have liked the movie. It's not for all yes but the movie is great. The wisecrack guy said bad doesn't mean it's really bad he is just a one person, a critic and he is a jackass for using click bait tactics to get more viewers in his channel.
Haven't seen the entirety of Dunkirk, but Dunkirks story benefits from being based of real life events and a significantly easier structure thats not nearly as complex as Tenet's. Lack of character in Dunkirk isn't as detrimental to that movie because the audience can already do half the work for relating to the characters; they're soldiers and we've seen dozens of soldier movies. But with a high velocity Sci fi time travel movie, character is a way more crucial point. That's just my take tho
You have rightly pointed out. In tenet we don’t make a connection with the main character hence the movie despite having some of the big action sequences doesn’t work at all. We don’t get convinced that the mankind is at stake.
I loved Tenet! It was one of the best films I’ve seen in a long time. Highly intelligent plot that made me think throughout and that’s the main reason it was so good, IMHO
I understood Tenet for the most part when I first saw it. It was so damn loud though. And the characters were bad. It was a great idea that needed a few tweaks to work properly.
I'm not saying that it is an Oscar deserving movie, all I'm saying is that it was an interesting viewing experience and I enjoy trying to unravel and make the pieces fit. I like a good puzzle. I just finished watching it earlier and it's a movie that I need to watch again before I pass my final judgement
if i had seen this video post my my first watch i would hv watched till end but nope . after watching it 5-6 times i felt this is his best work as a director !! it's not easy as it sounds . one need to re watch it to understand true essence of it . the way he choreographed and edited is simply awesome . maybe it's expectation tht disappointed many ...
The presumption you made this time was the classic structure of storytelling is a prerequisite for a good story. I was actually happy these 'aberrations' in filmmaking people did not like in Tenet. It's not his best movie but when you watch a Nolan movie, you need to treat it for what it is...a complicated filmmaking process that doesn't conform. A simple point : He purposefully doesn't establishes the protagonist's character....that's a choice not a mistake. The end point is: where you intrigued and entertained by his brand of cinema...if yes, Tenet succeeded. Nolan is often like Kubrik in this regard....his overtly complicated movies clearly do what 2001 did for kubrik.
Let’s be real here, Nolan literally thought about a bullet travelling in reverse and then took a left past the grandfather paradox with his curving element of inversion. Perhaps this film is more experimental, a thought experiment played out on a big budget and a Boeing 747. I think this is a piece of film however, even in the midst of a clunky narrative structure, this film sculpts time in an inventive way. Though this is not his best film, as I think interstellar signals his best work since the prestige, it is an important film that decidedly tries to communicate the density of Nolan’s ideas and creative force. I think the question of what existence means in time is properly fashioned through inversion as a question of existence in location and presence, rather than just the passing of a moment. I am happy to see “time travel” though it isn’t really time travel, taken seriously in cinema, as it is taken seriously in philosophical and scientific academia.
What went wrong? bruh, this is one of the best movies in decades imo, easily my top 10 / top 5 movies of all time. It has everything (except stupid sex scenes, thank you btw Nolan), the score, the filming, the mindfuck, it's all so good. The bromance, the acting level... 10/10
There's one more point I wanted you to touch, the concept of entropy and how it doesn't make ANY sense because it defies physics too much. I wish Nolan had put out some other term for this whole phenomenon because using the term "entropy" just made me feel like "yeah, this is nonsense, that's not what entropy is and I can't watch this movie seriously now".
Why the "reverse entropy" makes no sense? For the little I know, I think entropy is defined by the different possible states in a system (so high entropy=more states). So, if an object is reversed, its entropy lowers with the forward passage of time. And if the object is for an example a bullet, its entropy is lower when it's not fired yet, so, that's the direction it wants to go.
Some of these criticisms seem really weird to me, because there are plenty of movies that give their protagonists elusive backgrounds, or little or no characterization at all. Tenet has plenty of characterizing moments for The Protagonist, but it seems like some people want him to just tell someone a list of his motives and character traits. Even movies like Inception leave out plenty of information that we don't find out until the second and third acts, so it seems weird to criticize Tenet for doing the same thing.
Just because you didn't understand it doesn't make it bad. The fact that it deviated from normal cinematography is actually what makes it genius. Movie was phenomenal thought experiment turned into captivating narrative. And the character introduction did actually happen but reversed, in the end :d The end was deeply touching
Tenet may of fell short on being a good movie, but can we appreciate the practical effects Nolan pulled off in this movie? Majority of the sequences were done in camera w/ out cgi.
I will in a birthday party 15 years later with a beer in my hand say: "Oh!! That film Tenet! What about that!!? It is a film but time reverse in it, but how? In the first act there is that explanation scene where is shown that the agent can catch bullets, by reversing time for those objects. But later on all the characters go in a machine and from then on they self are going reserve in time. The people are through a machine going the other direction in time!! So! What is it?!! object or living things are going reverse in time?!! That movie... That movie didn't choose. It was bad."
I just wish the sound mixing wasn’t so bad. I couldn’t understand a thing in the movie theater which led to me not caring about the characters and pretty much just watching a spectacle
Sounds like Nolan wanted to make a video game into a movie. Blank slate characters work over there due to the interaction between the character and the player. You don't get that in a movie.
Tenet is by no means a perfect movie but I felt like this review was overly critical for you guys. I appreciate the effort into why you felt the story failed on a structural level but I don't think there was enough commentary on why the inversions and the philosophy of tenet failed you as a viewer aside from it being 'confusing.' I've watched a ton of videos on this channel but this was pretty weak.
"Does anyone believe these two want to Quibi and get busy?" Of course not. They exist in a Nolan film. For all his strengths as a writer and director the man CANNOT direct romance or sex.
I think Nolan is trying to break through to a higher Dimension and plane of consciousness, just like we can't possibly understand more than three dimensions of movement
Rank your fav Nolan films... we're curious! Also don't forget to check out World of Tanks here: tanks.ly/3t2BXlZ and use the code GIJOE21 for in-game perks. Thanks to World of Tanks for sponsoring this video!
I cannot decide between Inception and Interstellar. Both of them!
Momento has been my favorite Nolan film. It’s structure makes it incredibly rewatchable
i don't think all physics ideas should make philosophical sense
case in point : spooky action at a distance or "Quantum entanglement
"
the "reverser machine" actually makes time of objects effected by consciousness not just reversing how the object is moving back in time but that happens because the observer wants it
I don't think you guys actually understand the fact that conciseness effects time in the "movie" and more importantly only effects objects that have been reversed ((because objects have been reversed from the observer point of view))
Don't quote me on any of this i don't claim I'm a "physicist" but that's what happened in the movie "i think"
The Prestige. It's the only Nolan-film whose characters intrigue me as much as the world that was built.
Tenet in my top 5 Nolans, probably because I have a curious spirit and I don't get exhausted and mean when I get tired of thinking and I don't take it out on the thing I get tired of.. I just figure it out or don't. I usually do and then help ppl along find the stuff they can like when they thought there was stuff that was stopping them from liking things
Nolan wasn't shooting this film, he was catching it.
First comment before this blows up ☝
so today I wasn't just doing my business until I saw this video? I started my day by being ready to write this comment, until the video was finally uploaded?
@@veero25 That's not how time inversion works.
@@elbaecc why not🤨?
Don't try to understand it,
Just feel it
Calling him Cullen I feel is a bit lazy. Pattinson did a good job with what he was given. Having never watched Twilight, he is a pretty good actor.
Agreed. As bad as Tenet is, Pattinson has shown us (since Twilight) that he is a rather great actor.
Yeah feels like a cinema sins move. Little disappointed.
Even in twilight he’s clearly a standout among the cast (not that it says a ton lol) but he’s great all around
Bill nyferler
It was a good movie
You are dumb
I didn't know who Pattinson was until someone said its Cullen from Twilight and I was dragged to see that chick flick "Twilight" back then otherwise I would had never known who Pattinson was in my lifetime.
In short, more people know Cullen than Pattinson.
I honestly wouldn't watch anything with Pattinson as the main interest of a movie.
It's a low blow to refer to Pattinson as Cullen. His performance in Tenet was quite good.
And now in 2022 as The Batman. I think he has outshined his cringy past and then some.He has been on a slow methodical roll and I cannot wait to see him in what he is in next.
@@traviswallace1696 meh. The black dude from tenet is the only deeeeelicous part of the movie. You know you want his chocolate.
@@blackleague212 weirdo
He was one of the best parts of this film. Sadly, it still sucks.
I believe Tenet is meant to be viewed backwards. If you knew the relationship between the protagonist and Neil, Astor’s tragic marriage with Kat, you’d be invested in the characters. But you can’t . So you watch the movie and then are meant to *rewatch* it. Then it hits differently.
You got it perfectly
To many viewers, the closing of TENET's 3rd act is the end of the movie. For some, it's the beginning of another entertaining watch.
Same as memento, you have to view it first normally, and the in chronological order so all makes sense.
Neil was friends with Protagonist at the very start of the movie. Or so it seemed.
Maybe that’s the message. If we fully understood the future, we would be more invested in the now?
I believe this was a brilliant experiment by Nolan, trying to make a movie with 200% story and 0% characters
Not really, and I wouldn’t call it an “experiment”. This concept has been done before and so so so effectively in Stanley Kubrick’s 2001: A Space Odyssey
There's not much of a story either. I mean things happen but I wouldn't call it much of a story
He did that with Dunkirk
@@timothyday5187 I see we fail to detect sarcasm. Everything okay back home, dude?
Yes. He knew exactly what he was doing when he named his protagonist "Protagonist". And imo, he succeeded, or at least: he did not fail. Both concept and pacing are amazing
I think that if Tenet where a TV show, the longer run time could have given it time to shine. But that's just me
It would be like westworld
Actually, a longer run time would cause more problems, since there is more stuff to account for when looping the events of the movie around.
@@vidroiualin2060 You need to watch Dark. It is a 3 season long show full of time travel paradoxes without a single plot hole and has really great characters.
@@vipul5340 thank for the recommendation, it sounds actually interesting
You'd have another Lost.
I was stupid enough to drive 8 hrs to watch this movie in IMAX DURING A PANDEMIC and honestly I'm glad I did :) it may have been confusing, but experiencing an original mind bending concept w/ a great score was a subtle highlight in a horrible year.
I also got a citation on my way to see this movie. The most money I've spent to see a movie. Lol!
I dunno… I consider a film a “Fail”, if I care more about “YOUR” story arch than any character in the movie 🤨
Where do you live? On the moon?
@@nobodydoe he clearly lives in an area with no IMAX theatre, smartass
Why didn't you invert and make the police officer ticket himself
I enjoy driving, do you?
Don't care how well reasoned your argument is, I still love this movie! Not a perfectly made film but if you can get on board with the story then it can be a 10/10 viewing experience.
Had the biggest "Ohhhh holy shit!" moments when the Protagonist fought himself in the hallway and suddenly everything in the film started to make a lot more sense! Really enjoyed that moment.
The movie lost me at the war scene at the end. Those people jogging backwards was kinda cringe.
Nolan made an entire movie where time moves backwards, with amazing characters and a great first act where literally they show you the end of the film, abd it is amazing. I am speaking of course of Memento.
And done with a quarter of Tenet's budget.
Goldfish like memory
Irreversible did it better.
@@angelurbina8158 Actually just 4,5 % of Tenet's budget.
It's interesting, people like Ebert back in the 2000s ALSO called Memento a gimmick.
Gods... you can see his soul fleeing him as he talks through the G.I. Joe sponsorship thingie.
What are you breaking his balls? Lay off. He didn't come down to where you work and slap the broom out of your hand
That sponsorship looks dodgy, to be honest. Its basically, spend a lot to get so and so stickers and then play this here generic game...
@@markmaurer6370 fucking hell.
@@elbaecc I think you misunderstood the ad. When you sign up, you get a bunch of free stuff. You also get some missions you can complete to get additional free stuff.
And it's a bit unfair to call World of Tanks a generic game. It's been out for quite a while, and been so successful that they created additional games, like the one with ships and the one with planes.
I've tried playing it a few times over the last 6 or 7 years, never had any fun with it. But a lot of people do love it. 5 years ago in college half the computer science people I knew were playing. A lot of the war vets I work with also greatly enjoy the game.
I wouldn't really consider it too dodgy. And it's definitely miles better than a Raid Shadow Legends ad
Gotta get that bread being a philosopher doesn't pay well
I feel like nolan wanted to show off an exercise in reverse photography on the studio's dime. And this was the bare minimum story he needed to achieve this.
It's not even good at that. It's quite obvious when the actors are acting "backwards". Especially when they try to run or walk quickly.
@@snowballeffect7812 ya I kinda agree its definitely jarring but I still found the action cool.
@@wibblewobble3 Some parts were enjoyable and the the time pincer thing was a neat idea, but time travel always breaks down under the lightest scrutiny, so that didn't really help the movie either. It was definitely an ambitious endeavor, I'll give it that.
personally I thought that the movie’s complexity made it more fun to watch multiple times. Like solving a puzzle.
Agree
I loooove puzzle movies and that's why I hate Tenet. There's no puzzle to figure out, just the illusion of a puzzle. It's like doing a jigsaw puzzle where the pieces don't fit
People really dont like puzzles these days lmao
@@nevbezaire nah the pieces fit bro you just gotta watch it 8 times 🥴
@@FireShell7 no number of watches would explain what either Sador or Protagonist does during the car chase (for example) let alone all the logic errors related to time inversion (most of which exist solely to allow the plot to happen). Such a dumb movie posing as a smart one. I wish it just accepted its dumbness and let it be just the fun ride it is
"I'm gonna talk about Tenet. So spoilers ahead for Tenet, Inception and The Prestige."
Yeah I found that quite annoying. And it seemed like there might have been spoilers for other movies as well. I haven't seen Prestige yet and want to without it being spoiled.
"Bad" is definitely not the right word for Tenet. It's obvious that Nolan just wanted to do a movie with backwards action scenes. There isn't much more to the movie than that, and it's not on the level of Nolan's other works, but taken as simple spectacle, it's serviceable. Just because it's not a cinematic masterpiece doesn't mean it's bad.
This Movie gets better every time I rewatch it.
Exactly
I’ve watched it 6 times now, couldn’t agree more! Inception was my favorite but I think Tenet now rivals it. I remember watching it the first time and could not stop talking about all the philosophical ideas and mechanics of something this wild.
It gives me goosebumps now that so many theories emerge, niel dies in the end but it's the beginning of the protagonist, and if its a temporal pincers, protagonist is trying to save niel
I really am curious: why do you all watch this movie more than once? This isn’t the first time I read this in the comments and it’s something I can’t understand. I don’t want to sound rude but isn’t it a huge waste of time to watch the same two hour film again and again, over and over - up to six times and more?
@@tessavergissmeinnicht5142 waste of time is an interesting phrase here. What makes watching a movie not a wast of time? Maybe you’re saying, if you watch the same movie over and over, especially if you didn’t like it the first time, you’re losing time in finding great movies. However, I would disagree that movie watching is about finding great movies. To me it’s about finding something in the movie that interests you. I think these guys who watched Tenet multiple times are doing that. I’ve personally watched the Master like 10 times. And I don’t just say the typical, I find new things in it every time. I just love rewatching parts I really enjoy. Maybe every time I watch it I miss out on finding another great movie, but I don’t take it that seriously.
I’m stuck in temporal time loop watching Tenet again and again.
I enjoyed watching this movie. And it was even better the second time.
Same.
I'm not really sure why it got that much stick, it's not all that hard to make sense of it and poses a lot of interesting questions about fate and free will.
Same, enjoyed it in the theatre and recommended it to some friends. Not the best film I've ever seen but certainly above average imo
@@santiagobauza4257 because some people just can't let go of their bullshit and just enjoy something.
@@santiagobauza4257 It's not the the concept is that hard to wrap your head around. It's that who is doing what for what reason isn't established AT ALL. Like the bad guys are some vague shadow figures from the future that just kind of want to destroy the world. The good guys are good so they want to stop them... It's so bland and dull when you take away the hyped up sci-fi concept of things moving backwards through time. They literally go out of their way to make sure you know that they don't want you to know any details, which is just a complete waste of a good sci-fi concept.
What if Nolan is making a second movie, which reflects the other side of the Temporal Pincer move, which fills in all holes in this movie. Both are needed to understand
I love how pretentious this guy sounds while trying to say that tenet is too pretentious
Tenet may not be Nolan's best, but saying its "really bad" with a smug face is classic youtube video essay hyperbole bullshit, and I think everyone expects better from this channel.
Couldn’t have said it better
Exactly
Nah, it's objectively really bad. Only diehard Nolan fans can tolerate it.
But it is objectively bad. No one's hating you for enjoying it but it was poorly edited, the sound mixing was bad, the script was lazy, and there was no emotion or character.
I'm so happy that video's like TeneT are made even though a lot of people don't get it. They can watch all kinds of other (Hollywood's) movies explaining all in the movie itself by an actor or narrator and do not require any intelligence what so ever to digest it. Just be numbly entertained. Great choices everywhere!
Watching this made me realize: I like the concept/idea of fighting villains going backwards in time (plot) more than I like the overall movie. The choreography and some of the big reveals were amazing when it all clicked. But I'm couldnt relate/love many of the characters in the movie.
By the time you gain interest in many the movie is wrapping up. Maybe it's due to that final premise when Neil says this was the end but the protagonist starts. The intro to his arch/story.
A concept that starts/begins at the ends. A trilogy series that must to understand the value of the 1st film. But then again a tenant of movies are that each individual movie should be able to stand alone.
"Tenet is bad, like really bad"
It's ok to have bad taste.
I loved it. Easily one of Top 5 Chris Nolan films for me. It challenges you and demand you to understand the story on an absolutely different basis in comparison to 99% of Hollywood films. After every rewatch, Tenet just gets better, deeper and more fascinating to me.
Kind of lost faith in this reviewer the moment he said the Tenet hand gesture was the dumbest secret handshake. The meeting of the opposing hands and interlacing of the fingers is a perfect symbol of the movies forwards and backwards timelines existing in the same moment. How could he miss that?
I'm so tired of critics telling me that movies need relatable characters to be good. That is not true, and (for me) never has been. Characters can be mere vehicles to move the spectacle forward. That is what Nolan was doing with the Protagonist. Wisecrack hints at this, but I don't think you really get it.
Why should we care about the spectacle though?
@@dorukkaptan9926 Why do we care about fireworks? Spectacle isn't contingent on characters (see Mad Max: Fury Road.)
Yeah you’re clowning around if you want the blackops time warrior to have a fleshed out background
Trying to stop ww3 isn’t enough for you to invest in? They also added a woman fighting for her son and most likely rising to be the head of the organization that tries to stop this war? Still not enough?
Do you go on about character development in regular war movies?
Not setting up your protagonist was the point, it's the idea that he had to do what he needed without prompting him. Like dr strange not telling tony until moments before you know. In tenets case the audience was supposed to ride along without perception. So reverse inception?? IDK
But, it’s a spy movie. With the exception of Daniel Craig’s Bond, in a spy movie, the audience goes all the way through the 3rd act without knowing anything about the super-spy protagonist’s back story.
But we usually know their name and at least one thing that motivates them, and or how they feel about the situation there are in.
@Pranav M Well, let me be more specific: The Bond series except for Daniel Craig. The audience is given the same amount of knowledge about Bond’s past, and it’s been that way for decades. And besides, in Tenet, we do get a sense of The Protagonist’s moral compass. He is deeply concerned about the welfare of his crew, so much so that he sheds tears for them and is willing to die before ratting them out and getting them killed. He also has a heart for people’s welfare in general. In the planning of the plane heist, he’s concerned about not hurting civilians. So, why can’t you, Pranav, root for him? Maybe your mind was busy with the numerous machinations of the plot/rules of the world building and when they’re laid out? Where you concerned about the sound?
@@d3j4v00 It’s true that we never get his name, but so what? And his feelings about each situation he was in were pretty apparent to me. He just faced each problem with this glib super-confident attitude kinda like, well, James Bond. That’s what I think Nolan was going for, but it seems like you didn’t see it that way
@@JustinRevis I did see the glib super confidence but it didn't turn into a character flaw like it does for Bond. The more I learn about bond the longer his odds seem, the more I am impressed and relieved when his confidence pays off. The more I learn about the Protagonist the more I realize he's already won and there's nothing he can do but go through the necessary motions. Bond is overconfident and messy but lucky enough to make up for it and the stakes are high enough that the ends justify the mess. With this guy I think he's going to be like that but no, his glib overconfidence is met by plot armor, we find out in the airport that he's already won. He has more and more capable supporting characters appear out of nowhere as the movie processes at the perfect time. The stakes are life and death at the beging and lower through out the runtime. By the end the protagonist is not a flawed hero who overcame but a Syssiphus who is damned to live out his days orchestrating an operation that already happened.
@Pranav M Again, you’re talking about Daniel Craig’s Bond which is the most emotional Bond of them all. Of course we feel what he feels. His emotions are far more apparent than his predecessors, so we feel his pain. Have you ever watched Sean Connery’s Bond? He has the same level of confidence. I guess he was more of icon of success generation. A wish fulfillment fantasy for young men of the time to place themselves in. He didn’t need to have so much depth. Now perhaps, in Tenet, we have the Protagonist to be a kind of “wish fulfillment fantasy” for young black men? Up until now, I’ve hardly ever seen that kind of success in hands of a black man on screen; not without them being drug dealer or sports star, but I digress. I certainly DO NOT want to tell you how to feel. I just want to present to you what the Writer was going for, and how it worked for me. :)
Wisecrack watching the movie: there are so many things wrong with Tenet
Me: whoah, coolness...
watch the "closer look" regarding tenet as tenet acording to nolan is a study for screenwriters to learn how a film with a complex plot can't always make a film good as the audience only truly connects to characters and their emotions through their emotional jounrey
REPORTER: You've just released a new movie with the title of "Tenet". Can you briefly tell us what is this all about?
NOLAN: It's about the protagonist...
REPORTER: Who is the protagonist?
NOLAN: That's him.
All true what you said. I still like the movie. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
It was really chaotic, and I didn't understand what was going on the whole time. When I left the cinema was the moment the film got into my mind. I thought the whole way home about what future generations will think about us. What prize the future pays for our carelessness? Can we save humanity from a harder life on this planet?
I read a review that drew parallels with Interstellar later. Asking similar questions.
So the hour after I left the cinema was the value I gained from it. And I want to rewatch it. Something I can not say about Inception.
I liked it, especially the second watch
Even better when you watch it in reverse
It only gets better, this will be studied by scientists
Answer to the question posed by the video title - "Nothing went wrong."
I mean, if people don't know what a Christopher Nolan movie is by this point, then there's not much one can do about that. (Or he just might not be for you, which is totally fine. Different strokes for different folks).
The first time I watched it, there were questions floating around in my head, but because I know who's telling the story I know it'll all come together by the end - like all of his puzzles/movies. I felt like most of the criticism I read about it were people saying they were lost and it didn't make sense, and I just didn't get that at all. Watch it again, after you know what's happening and you'll be more impressed (if you weren't already). Each subsequent viewing gets better and better, but I'll admit it's the Nolan-iest Christopher Nolan movie ever, and I'm here for it.
Tenet has a 70% rotten tomato score, a 7.5 on IMDb and has 2 Oscar noms for visuals and production design. While it’s not the best Nolan film calling it “really bad” is definitely a stretch.
It has really good aspects but as a film it's not fun to watch, there's very little to enjoy past the visuals and fight scenes, the concept is cool but half the movie is exposition
Tenet is so complex and interesting movie. It invites you to watch it several times to understand characters motives (just like memento). Not because a movie is complex and difficult to understand is a bad movie. Tenet is mean to be a cult classic. I just love it. BTW. If you watch it more than once, you will understand characters in a better way.
On first watch in the theatre I loved it, but I had some questions like: wasn't there a thing with a painting? But on second viewing it became my favourite film.
A PSA to UA-cam film critics:
Just because something didn't follow the structure or "rules" that your sophomore film studies class prof said all films should follow doesn't mean it's bad.
if the characters, dialogue and story are bad, then the film is bad. this video does a pretty good job explaining the structural problems that leads to the movie being worse than it had potential to be. it only takes a few tweaks at the foundations to change a great movie into a bad one, and vice versa.
in my opinion, I think Nolan wanted us to experience the world, not necessarily the characters. This is my opinion.
He points that out in the video. Nolan wanted a clean state protagonist that would learn what was going on and experience the world at a similar rate to the viewer.
The issue that myself and many others have is that the move is more of a thought experiment than a movie.
I would've gotten the same enjoyment had I been sent a document explaining the rules of the worlds and some hypothetical situations to consider.
Overall most of the movie itself was just "fine".
But they don't even explain any details about the world. Just that there is this cool sci-fi time reversal concept in this world. Who are the bad guys exactly ? Who are the good guys exactly ? Why are people motivated to fight on which side when nothing is explained.. No one has any idea why they are doing what or on what side they are truly fighting for. It's just ''they want to end the world and we want to stop them''.. The who, what & why is never established.. Just the how is established. That isn't world building, that's obsessing over a sci-fi concept at the detriment of literally everything else. Which is fine, but lets not pretend this is masterpiece of world building.
For me I watched it, didn't understand it, but loved it. I kinda wanna leave it at that, but I find myself going back to watch it again. Its different but genius.
Leave it at that! There's nothing to understand. If I could go back in time and stop myself from both thinking about the movie and watching it a second time, I would. Then I might still like it a bit. It's best enjoyed as a visceral ride through a confusing landscape
*Sees Title*
That god damn audio mixing.
oh please. the audio was great.
@@razorwireclouds5708 Fuck that. I spent far more effort trying to make out what the characters were saying than understanding the plot. I had to use the scenes that followed conversations as context clues as to the jist of what said conversations had probably been about.
@@xVancha which scenes did you have a hard time understanding?
@@razorwireclouds5708 Most of them? Ones held in gasmasks, in the midst of trains going by or the static of seaspray of course, but even conversations held in quieter environments had "whats", "hows" and/or "whys" that went by unintelligibly.
@@xVancha Weird. I had no such issues. Did you see it in a cinema? Could be the theater's speakers being shitty.
I saw it at home because if COVID, so I heard pretty much everything pretty clearly on my home speakers.
A film that does not fall within your extremely limited description of what a film and its elements should be does not fail. You simply don't quite grasp it, and not in the sense that it's complicated. It's just not a typical three acter. Tenet properly experiments with the rules of writing for film and most of the odd choices make sense in a way we haven't seen in a long time.
Think Lynch, von Trier, or Tarkovsky. Your searching, grasping experience of watching the film makes you part of it. If you fail to notice/grasp these subtleties, you critisism falls dead. If you disengage and get yourself worked up about how the first act does not give what you think you're entitled to and completely miss how much respect you are being given as an audience member... well maybe just rewatch what you know you like?
Tenet is radically different from Nolan's previous films and it will go down in history as pivotal in his career. He has put the people who want more of the same on notice. Stay awake or find a new favorite.
I haven't had an engaging film experience like this in a long time.
What happened? You guys are usually very much on point.
Um. The Protagonist's character was awesome because he had no real perceivable self, believed in doing good at any cost, and thought what he did brought him closer to his destiny which he saw as being a good person for the sake of being good (thus fulfilling ideal destiny). If I saw it in a Disney movie I would hate it for sure, but in this movie, it was even more engrossing and not cheesy because until the end there weren't so many "You are The One" moments.
The mechanics were basic brain candy that I enjoyed, and the ending "You masterminded this" moments were predictable, but despite that, I enjoyed it and would definitely be happy to recommend it to anyone that wants a big-screen film for any given night.
I didn't like how lambasting the audio was when trying to decipher dialogue sometimes. Maybe that was just the theater I was in.
I thought it was lit, but I'm also a sucker for Nolan films and time travel. Sound mixing was a bit messy, but I thought the story made perfect sense as long as you pay attention.
Both my friend and I couldn’t remember any of the character names when we left the cinema.
Personally, I liked. I don't require movies to follow the big Hollywood 3 act structure - I like when filmmakers and novelists experiment with stories and how to tell them. One thought though - there is the possibility that when the protagonist takes the cyanide pill, he does kill himself, and the rest of the story is some sort of death dream where he gets to be THE PROTAGONIST in his own story.
I'm glad people are FINALLY realizing that Nolan is an alien robot who only thinks of humans as motivation for cool scenes & cinematic tricks.
But hey, at least we now know love "transcends dimensions of space & time." 👽🤖
Lmao it’s more like Nolan is an average human being but most people today are too stupid to understand and pay attention to simple details.
A. Art is subjective B. First wisecrack video in which ad was better than main content.
Watched it today, and I define it as follows: great director, great cinematography, great acting, great locations, great action setpieces, great wardrobe, great soundtrack, just not engaging.
I really like this movie and still think about it and it's rules. Same goes for "Devs" - there are my favs in 2020.
Alex Garland is so underrated and I'm glad to see another fan of his out in the world.
I really think wisecracks missed the mark on this one. You get the satisfaction when you watch the movie a second time. There is great characterization but you need to dig a little
I think it was fun to find out about the loop. I was intrigued by the time moving backwards and stuff. the world itself was enigmatic enough for me to be interested. but you're right, the characters were sacrificed
The only persisting thought I had during Tenet, aside from how I couldn't understand 90% of the dialogue because the sound mixing was atrocious, was how they filmed John David Washington fighting his inverted self. That was particularly cool, and I wanna know how they did that. Everything else was forgettable.
💯
I think you missed the movie for the plot. Nolan is venturing out of his Jungian, corporate style, and leaning into southern gothic in this one, head on.
What went wrong with Tenet......THE FUCKING AUDIO!!! IDK WTF Nolan was thinking but whatever he had up his ass to mix down the audio the way he did made it entirely unwatchable. Because you know what I love doing while watching a movie? Constantly adjusting the volume...... I was okay with the complex time warping storyline, thats what made it interesting. Its the mix that forces me to constantly have my hand on the volume control, or constantly messing with the EQ, to make it sound decent and/or not wake up the neighborhood. Tenets mix is hot garbage, period.
God I really wanted to love Tenet. I watched it a few times and analyzed sequences, HOPING it would grow on me. It has lots to love, but there's just so much getting in the way.
From the inconsistent internal logic (ex. nothing about catching inverted bullets makes sense, that shooting range being a prime example),
To the odd direction (there is barely a shot of the army they're fighting in Stalsk-12, it's 10 minutes of them running and shooting at... something),
To the strange creative choices like not naming the protagonist (fans will be calling him 'TP' for the rest of time, Chris, hope you're happy), to the sound mixing that only hardcore fanboys defend.
Don't get me started one the unappealing villain. I suspect that the screenplay suffers from Jonathan Nolan's absence who has a much better feel for screenwriting.
What went wrong?
Nothing
I feel like Nolan was trying to make the Tenet, the organization in the movie, a character in itself (similar to how Gotham is kind of a character in the Dark Knight trilogy. The organization cannot be fully understood the first time watching the movie, because that wouldn't be a character arc. But if you go back and understand the character arc it ends up being very satisfying. I wasn't able to fully get it the first time while watching the 3rd act, but it's possible.
Nope, you missed this one. Tenet ain't a secret genius, it's a complete genius. You just have to see it more than once to understand, that's all. If you can't do that, then there's nothing more I can say. It's a gem of a movie, and those of us who could understand the film absolutely loved it.
The only thing that actually sucks about this movie is the sound mixing. They screwed the pooch on that one. It's impossible without subtitles. If they made a remastered edition where they fix that, it would be an excellent film.
I wish you happiness on pretentious island.
I think you can forgive Nolan for trying to make an impossible movie. He is a genius, but even geniuses have their flaws.
3:06 He shouldn't be able to do that, that makes no sense. The object is dead, it's in resting mode, it has no will of it's own. The protagonist is acting forwards in time. The act of him catching the thing, implies that he had dropped the thing in the future, but that doesn't make sense. He isn't an inverted person. You either do things forward or backwards in time. This implies we all actually impact the world both forwards and backwards in time all the time, which is just stupid and makes everything unnecessarily complicated.
I couldn't even get an hour into this movie. I like movies like Momento. But this movie starts with the scene after scene of non-stop monotone talking, with each starting and stopping so fast, that they just all seemed to blend into one long non-stop one. It felt like the kind of episode recap you get right before the finale of a long running show, rather than the show itself.
It's funny you used James Bond as a faceless protagonist cause I figured out like 20 mins in to the film it was a gonna be a James Bond film because of that I really enjoyed it.
Christopher Nolan has made no secret of his love for classic James Bond movies and how they’ve been a big influence on his work from the mountain scenes in Inception to the plane hijack in Dark Knight Rises.
Meh, I really enjoyed this film. I plan on watching it again.
🤟🏼
I didnt like Tenet at first but each time I watched it I love it more and more.
Unlike most movies, like MCU, I keep wanting to go back to find more stuff.
It's not a conventional movie and that's one the things that makes it so great.
Wisecrack: Tenet is cryptic therefore bad.
ME: Primer is good. Why?
What's funny about TENET detractors is that they cringe at things such as handshakes from the officer in the first act or lines like "Including my son" while at the same time complain saying things like "I need emotional arcs for these characters" or "these characters lack of emotional depth"... lol
"including my son" is like young darth vader complaining he hates sand. Like, okay, sure, it's motivated by character and emotion just handled clumsily. and anakin had better dialog. and i could hear it in the audio mix.
@@rebeccakeller4666 I understand the line was cringe to some (or most) because was badly delivered, but it makes total sense being Neil in the room taking care of her. So yeah.
It seems to me that writers and directors are creating content based on the availability of technology and future technologies. So if a budget is cut, the staff has to modify expectations/story/plot, basically gutting the plot because technically they can’t do it anymore.
I think my problem wasn’t understanding it. It’s that once I understood I just thought “oh. Okay.”
Man, I feel like I’m the only one in this universe that really liked this film hahahaa
You're not.
You're not. Many people have liked the movie. It's not for all yes but the movie is great. The wisecrack guy said bad doesn't mean it's really bad he is just a one person, a critic and he is a jackass for using click bait tactics to get more viewers in his channel.
You can't criticize this movie for having uninteresting characters you know little about, then turn around and praise Dunkirk.
Haven't seen the entirety of Dunkirk, but Dunkirks story benefits from being based of real life events and a significantly easier structure thats not nearly as complex as Tenet's. Lack of character in Dunkirk isn't as detrimental to that movie because the audience can already do half the work for relating to the characters; they're soldiers and we've seen dozens of soldier movies. But with a high velocity Sci fi time travel movie, character is a way more crucial point. That's just my take tho
This is such a straightforward movie what are you guys talking about?
I went to see Tenent at AMC dolby. Parts of it still felt inaudible, in a "well aligned, great theater."
You have rightly pointed out. In tenet we don’t make a connection with the main character hence the movie despite having some of the big action sequences doesn’t work at all. We don’t get convinced that the mankind is at stake.
I loved Tenet! It was one of the best films I’ve seen in a long time. Highly intelligent plot that made me think throughout and that’s the main reason it was so good, IMHO
I understood Tenet for the most part when I first saw it. It was so damn loud though. And the characters were bad. It was a great idea that needed a few tweaks to work properly.
characters were great. wtf are you on about?
I'm not saying that it is an Oscar deserving movie, all I'm saying is that it was an interesting viewing experience and I enjoy trying to unravel and make the pieces fit. I like a good puzzle. I just finished watching it earlier and it's a movie that I need to watch again before I pass my final judgement
if i had seen this video post my my first watch i would hv watched till end but nope . after watching it 5-6 times i felt this is his best work as a director !! it's not easy as it sounds . one need to re watch it to understand true essence of it . the way he choreographed and edited is simply awesome . maybe it's expectation tht disappointed many ...
The presumption you made this time was the classic structure of storytelling is a prerequisite for a good story. I was actually happy these 'aberrations' in filmmaking people did not like in Tenet. It's not his best movie but when you watch a Nolan movie, you need to treat it for what it is...a complicated filmmaking process that doesn't conform.
A simple point : He purposefully doesn't establishes the protagonist's character....that's a choice not a mistake.
The end point is: where you intrigued and entertained by his brand of cinema...if yes, Tenet succeeded.
Nolan is often like Kubrik in this regard....his overtly complicated movies clearly do what 2001 did for kubrik.
Nope, not that comparison, let's not be animals here please
If this was a James Bond movie, everyone would have loved it. This is the origin story to the a new 007.
The whole problem is we don't have a word for a visual narrative tech demo and we assumed this work was to be judged like it was a movie.
Let’s be real here, Nolan literally thought about a bullet travelling in reverse and then took a left past the grandfather paradox with his curving element of inversion. Perhaps this film is more experimental, a thought experiment played out on a big budget and a Boeing 747. I think this is a piece of film however, even in the midst of a clunky narrative structure, this film sculpts time in an inventive way. Though this is not his best film, as I think interstellar signals his best work since the prestige, it is an important film that decidedly tries to communicate the density of Nolan’s ideas and creative force. I think the question of what existence means in time is properly fashioned through inversion as a question of existence in location and presence, rather than just the passing of a moment. I am happy to see “time travel” though it isn’t really time travel, taken seriously in cinema, as it is taken seriously in philosophical and scientific academia.
What we need is a sequel setting up this film aka...A Theatrical Pincer.
this got to be the worst Wisecrack essay yet
let's just say that if south park tried again to roast Nolan's movie, like they did for Inception, their gag would be exactly the same.
I never actually saw tenet. But... since when is a causal loop a twist in a time travel movie?? It's practically an expectation of the genre
What went wrong? bruh, this is one of the best movies in decades imo, easily my top 10 / top 5 movies of all time. It has everything (except stupid sex scenes, thank you btw Nolan), the score, the filming, the mindfuck, it's all so good. The bromance, the acting level... 10/10
There's one more point I wanted you to touch, the concept of entropy and how it doesn't make ANY sense because it defies physics too much. I wish Nolan had put out some other term for this whole phenomenon because using the term "entropy" just made me feel like "yeah, this is nonsense, that's not what entropy is and I can't watch this movie seriously now".
Why the "reverse entropy" makes no sense? For the little I know, I think entropy is defined by the different possible states in a system (so high entropy=more states). So, if an object is reversed, its entropy lowers with the forward passage of time. And if the object is for an example a bullet, its entropy is lower when it's not fired yet, so, that's the direction it wants to go.
Some of these criticisms seem really weird to me, because there are plenty of movies that give their protagonists elusive backgrounds, or little or no characterization at all. Tenet has plenty of characterizing moments for The Protagonist, but it seems like some people want him to just tell someone a list of his motives and character traits. Even movies like Inception leave out plenty of information that we don't find out until the second and third acts, so it seems weird to criticize Tenet for doing the same thing.
“Noooooooo, a movie shouldn’t make you think!!! All movies should be Marvel comedies!!!”
Just because you didn't understand it doesn't make it bad. The fact that it deviated from normal cinematography is actually what makes it genius. Movie was phenomenal thought experiment turned into captivating narrative. And the character introduction did actually happen but reversed, in the end :d The end was deeply touching
Tenet may of fell short on being a good movie, but can we appreciate the practical effects Nolan pulled off in this movie? Majority of the sequences were done in camera w/ out cgi.
I will in a birthday party 15 years later with a beer in my hand say: "Oh!! That film Tenet! What about that!!? It is a film but time reverse in it, but how? In the first act there is that explanation scene where is shown that the agent can catch bullets, by reversing time for those objects. But later on all the characters go in a machine and from then on they self are going reserve in time. The people are through a machine going the other direction in time!! So! What is it?!! object or living things are going reverse in time?!! That movie... That movie didn't choose. It was bad."
I just wish the sound mixing wasn’t so bad. I couldn’t understand a thing in the movie theater which led to me not caring about the characters and pretty much just watching a spectacle
Sounds like Nolan wanted to make a video game into a movie. Blank slate characters work over there due to the interaction between the character and the player. You don't get that in a movie.
Tenet is by no means a perfect movie but I felt like this review was overly critical for you guys. I appreciate the effort into why you felt the story failed on a structural level but I don't think there was enough commentary on why the inversions and the philosophy of tenet failed you as a viewer aside from it being 'confusing.' I've watched a ton of videos on this channel but this was pretty weak.
"Does anyone believe these two want to Quibi and get busy?"
Of course not. They exist in a Nolan film. For all his strengths as a writer and director the man CANNOT direct romance or sex.
I think Nolan is trying to break through to a higher Dimension and plane of consciousness, just like we can't possibly understand more than three dimensions of movement
This wasn't my favorite Nolan movie for sure, but it still was an enjoyable movie experience.