It’s not their fault, they’re just doing their jobs, but the point of Christopher Nolan’s latest film Tenet is not to read about it as dozens of great minds jockey for most observant point not made by anyone else. They have to do their job and their job, in the parlance of our times, is to write down what they thought, to analyze, to assess for worthiness, to make sense of the thing. Film criticism at its absolute best helps to put a film in proper context as the story of film rages onward. Only critics can really do that. Audiences, of course, ultimately decide whether a film is a hit, and often film FANS will decide how watchable a movie can be 20 years from now. Film critics can’t always capture what a room full of tilted heads in the darkness can – that magic moment of light and sound and image and OH MY GOD.
Critics can fixate on a film and usher it through history, hand-picking it for legend status. They do and can revive an entire career from the scrap heap. But there is one thing they can’t do. They can’t do what Tenet is meant to do. That is, provide a place for summer crowds to escape the heat and dip into two hours of mind-blowing entertainment.
You don’t expect the NY Times’ Jessica Kiang to help you through that one. Or Guy Lodge at Variety. Or Jonathan Romney at the LA Times.
What you need is a pocketful of cash, a bucket of popcorn, and an open mind. That is what the theatrical experience of a movie like Tenet has to offer you. Pure escapism. Glorious cinematography. Mind-bending visual effects and a chance to slip out of normal life and into the complex insane brain of Christopher Nolan.
Eric Weber:
#TENET reviews that include any personal feelings about it being released in this climate should be immediately DQ’d
— AWARDS ACE (@ErickWeber) August 21, 2020
You can read the reviews if you want. You can parse them for the film’s worth and decide whether it’s an “Oscar Movie” or not. Honestly, that is a hard question to ask since Oscar movies of this kind will always be based on how much money a film made and whether or not it captured the zeitgeist.
Mike Ryan:
I’ve been struggling with how to cover a movie like TENET, a film trying to get people back in theaters in the U.S. during a pandemic when experts say it’s the last thing we should do. And, morally, at all endorsing or normalizing something I wouldn’t do. https://t.co/9hX3Jg7wx9
— Mike Ryan (@mikeryan) August 21, 2020
Jason Gorber (SlashFilm):
“The plot of Tenet has been wrapped in secrecy, so we’ll be dancing around a lot of the more major twists and turns. Suffice it to say, Nolan has upped the ante compared to his earlier time twisting works…”
— Jason Gorber (@filmfest_ca) August 21, 2020
“Christopher Nolan’s time-bending action spectacular is the perfect film to get us back in cinemas – one viewing just won’t be enough,” writes @robbiereviews.
‘Tenet’ review: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐https://t.co/xR8QE9pwHL
— The Telegraph (@Telegraph) August 21, 2020
Robbie Collin has the right idea, except for one thing: WE CAN’T SEE THE MOVIE.
Here we are, stuck in our homes with nothing but Politics Twitter and Will Mavity’s rumination on which berry is the worst one (he says blueberry – I’m not so sure. I might have to go with elderberry). We are all losing our minds. And we all want what we can’t have – the chance to watch Tenet on a too-hot afternoon, crammed into seats elbow to elbow, with no virus hovering in droplets that might drift from one of us to another. We want the world back the way it used to be.
Can we all stop beating around the bush and admit that blueberries are objectively the worst berry?
— Will Mavity (@mavericksmovies) August 21, 2020
And we want Tenet, damnit. We want Tenet.
