In an age of Hollywood where the term blockbuster often means sequels, reboots and remixes and originality is considered dead, Christopher Nolan’s TENET looks to give everybody a much-deserved arse-kicking. The film is written and directed by Christopher Nolan (The Dark Knight Trilogy, Interstellar, Inception), one of the few directors whose name doesn’t just mean something to film buffs but to the most casual of audiences as well.
The film stars John David Washington (BlacKkKlansman), Robert Pattinson (Good Time), Elizabeth Debicki (Widows) and of course, Nolan’s lucky charm, Michael Caine, and is described as a massive action blockbuster. It’s shot using a combination of 70MM and IMAX cameras, with Dunkirk cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema back handling the camera. Perhaps the biggest surprise is the lack of composer Hans Zimmer, who has worked on every single Nolan film since Batman Begins. Unfortunately, Zimmer is busy composing for another highly anticipated film of 2020, Dune. That said, Ludwig Göransson (Black Panther, The Mandalorian), who is bloody awesome in his own right was brought in to compose for Tenet.
The first trailer that debuted months ago was nothing short of spectacular. Here’s the second trailer. (Fair warning, though, you might want to keep an extra pair of underpants on standby.)
Official synopsis of TENET:
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Let’s not fool ourselves. It’s Christopher Nolan we’re talking about. He’s not going to tell you what the movie is about or even give you a tiny hint, 7 months before its release.
However, from the trailer itself, we can sort of deduce that it’s an espionage film of sorts, in which the lead character’s failure to complete his mission could lead to World War III. There’s also some mindf*ckery time manipulation going on. Recently, Samuel Lim wrote a piece dissecting the first trailer in an effort to try and explore what Tenet could be about (click here).
A while back, Robert Pattinson described the experience reading the script as “unreal”:
“I’ve been a little wary of doing big movies for years and years, but there’s just something about Chris Nolan’s stuff. He seems like the only director now who can do what is essentially a very personal, independent movie that has huge scale. I read the script and it’s unreal.”
TENET is set for a July 2020 release.
