Movie lovers everywhere have waited a long time for this.

With the recent openings of movie theaters across Colorado, people have been flooding into theaters to see the newest Christopher Nolan movie, Tenet. A long-anticipated film, since it was supposed to come out in May of 2020, but was put on hold because of the COVID-19 outbreak. Release dates for this movie were changed three times before it finally came out on September 3, but it was worth the wait: Tenet is an extraordinary

This movie is set somewhere in the future right before World War III. Explaining too much of the plot of the film would give away a lot of its core meaning. Tenet is complex and at times hard to understand, but this is exactly what keeps you so intrigued throughout the full two and a half hours. Now, let’s get into why you may or may not want to see this movie with the least amount of spoilers as possible.

The film starts and ends at a very fast pace. Throughout the movie, we follow the Protagonist (who remains nameless) and his partner, Niel, on an international mission to put an end to the plans of top dog weapon dealer, Andrei. The heart of the film is Kat, although she is not necessarily the protagonist’s love interest. He was driven by his determination to help her as she was married to Andrei who was, as the antagonist should be, a real stinker. Kat is also the only character with a real background story, until the end. We don’t know much about any of the characters except Andrei and Kat, which in this story was an exceptional decision by Nolan because it keeps it from being overkill. Like Nolan’s other films, Tenet focuses on the construct and manipulation of time. It includes scenes where some characters are moving normally through time and some are moving backward, which means what people are experiencing in normal time has already happened to people moving backward (from our forward-moving perspective). The movie calls inversion, and it goes way deeper than that, but you’ll have to go deeper than that.

Visually, this is an incredible movie to see. One scene in particular, you see a building explode, then rebuild itself, then explode again. In another you see one character fighting themselves, but from the future. Throughout the movie, there are small things in earlier scenes that mean nothing, but then have a world of meaning later. This film would require rewatching a few times to get a full understanding of it. And that’s what makes it amazing. The sound production on this film is also very interesting. It is an extremely loud movie so beware. At times it’s hard to understand what characters are saying, but that is an artistic choice made by the director in order to make the viewer feel as if they’re right with the characters. It’s also meant to make the viewer feel uncomfortable and confused. 

To me, this film is a must see. Every frame of this film has something that needs to be to be paid attention to, and from start to finish you are completely infatuated with it. The audio of the film ties in perfectly with the visuals. The acting in the film is also really good, which is always good if you want to avoid cringing. And plus, it’s nice to have a new movie with a completely different concept than anything I’ve ever seen; it’s not a superhero movie and definitely not a love story which is refreshing. All in all, if you can bear to keep a mask on for two and half hours, go see Tenet and be ready to have your mind twisted.