TENET

Christopher Nolan weaves his black magic this time - a first Black as the protagonist - in the much-awaited flick designed to beat the audience blues and bring the die-hard fans of good cinema back to theatres in the pandemic backdrop.

It is clearly a James Bond-like film sans the excess baggage and the liberties the makers flung on the trusted audience. The protagonist John David Washington just does not say the name is Bond but does everything in his `easy' ways as he says in one of the earlier exchanges of dialogues with his best buddy Robert Pattinson.

Much like the offering of top Indian filmmakers, who never let the audience think, thanks to his Man-Friday editor Kamaal, Nolan is best served by the crafty work of Jennifer Lame. The other winner is the visual angles so dexterously captured by the versatile hand of Hoyte van Hoytema.

The jaw-dropping car chase and the blowing up of a plane follow the opening frame of mayhem in an Opera House, where a score of legs try in vain to scamper for safety.

The reason we get to know as Washington is a secret agent employed by Tenet with a mission. A dangerous time-bending machine with so many layers unfolding is too fast for the normal eye to follow course. 

You get to see a barrage of bullets going backwards with the director harping in his inimitable style that the world can be changed not by travelling the time but by inverting it. That sets the mood with a range of fringe characters added in a mission of racing against time and hell-bent on defying gravity.

Sure, the weak links are there - in the form of a Russian oligarch and the seemingly monotonous spat with his estranged wife - neat work by Elizabeth Debicke.

There is our own Dimple Kapadia, playing her part in the letter, in a meaningful character as an arms dealer. As Priya, the veteran stands upright and at her wiliest self, thanks to the efficient work of designer Jeffrey Kurtland, who had done wonders to Dimple's coloured hair and costumes.

Nolan had never dared to send across any messages but this time, one could read between the lines. That humanity's survival depending on the simple formula of reshaping time and space is the implicit one.

'Take It Easy' formula by way of a popular song in Kollywood seems to have worked on Nolan's overworked mind. So long the individual is earnest in the approach, it hardly matters if the results do not go in the intended direction. Put it simply as one of the characters advises the protagonist to not go deep to understand the mechanism - Nolan at his delightful best, giving space to each character sans preaching.

Sure, there could be better ways to prevent a third World War. In a visual medium charged with a competitive edge, Nolan sticks to his tried and trusted formula. Going overboard will have the share of accusing fingers, a fact not to be missed.

A no-brainer but the plot has enough ingredients and spice to have you hooked for the best part of two and a half hours. If that is a sort of victory, for sure Nolan has earned it.