Tenet Review: 4 Ups & 6 Downs

2. A Totally Wasted Cast

It comes to something when even those who worked on the film couldn't get through a single day of shooting without stopping to ask questions. Such is the reality of how overly convoluted and complex Tenet is, but that innate sense of not REALLY knowing where scenes are going or how your character feels about a given reveal comes through in every performance.

John David Washington and Robert Pattinson as a buddy cop-meets-tech savvy duo are easily the best thing here, but they're so rarely given time to shine. Even simple dialogue scenes that should engender you to Washington's cause or be amazed by Pattinson channeling Tom Hardy's "Dream a little bigger, darling" scene from Inception get butchered by the edit.

I've mentioned Kenneth Branagh's Andrei and Elizabeth Debicki's Kat as severely one-note, and the scriptwriting is doubly standout because we can see brilliantly gifted actors given the barest minimum of range or things to do. Even Michael Caine pops up - arguably as himself - for ONE scene, despite placement in the trailers and marketing.

Any semblance of humanity is thoroughly surface level; skirted over to get to the next action set-piece or wannabe mind-blowing reveal.

Tenet the movie IS Tenet the in-world explanation, and that's it.