A giant, failed experiment in anti-character focused storytelling; but its failure is so compelling, batshit and utterly earnest that I cannot help but admire it. Tenet is mostly not good, but it’s not good in a way that only a filmmaker who has absolutely nothing to lose could accomplish. 

My “hot take” is that Elizabeth Debicki could be removed entirely to the benefit of the film. I’m sorry, but I see no reason for an “emotional core” here. This is a movie that excels in chugging along to the next set piece and reducing Hollywood conventions to their absolute barest, least human components. Debicki’s arc fails due to the fact that we are asked to care about her clichéd emotional turmoils amidst a narrative that constantly asks its audience to feign any emotional investment in its characters on, like, a base level. This is a movie so aware of its emotional disconnect that it never feels right switching from the insane time-travel stuff to her overwrought melodrama. 

Anyways, I had a great time.