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This week, on What the Hell Was That:
Stuffed with whatever you call the opposite of explanation, Tenet is one of the biggest and best movies of our time by one of our biggest and best filmmakers alive. Is it kind of heartless? Does Sir Michael Caine forget his usual Nolan exposition duties? Is it great and bad? Now is the time for this conversation.
Joe’s Back of the Box
The fate of all humanity rests in the hands of the protagonist (John David Washington) as the world sits on the brink. When a Russian oligarch (Kenneth Branagh) finds the means to erase all of humanity it becomes not just a race against time but through time itself. The twists and turns will keep you guessing right up to the last second. Can the protagonist save the day or will he be inverted and disappear forever…?
The REAL Back of the Box
Um. Look. This movie tells you in the first 10 minutes, “don’t try to understand it”. If you watch this movie as an act of mindfulness and accept what they are saying and doing in the moment, it is a fun ride. If you put any thought, any thought into it, the movie breaks down. Thankfully they do not try to overexplain or even really explain anything going with the tact of assuming you should know. It mostly works. There are some fun fight scenes and chase scenes as people move backwards and forwards in time. It is a movie that suffers from thinking it is smarter than it is. If you can get past all of that, Tenet is worth the ride. If you cannot, well, you are in for a long and boring movie.