Katerina Writes

Tenet is underrated and underappreciated film. It is one of those movies that can make your brain hurt. 

Its time-inversion mechanics are complex, and its action sequences are enormous, especially the highway heist with the trucks and the fire engine. Ludwig Göransson’s soundtrack makes the scene even more spectacular. All of this is classic Christopher Nolan: ambitious ideas, exotic locations, massive sets, and heart-stopping action.

But in most Nolan films, the explosions and the intellectual puzzles are not the heart of the story. Beneath the spectacle, there is usually one simple human idea. 

 Inception gives us shared dreams, folding cities and people fighting on ceilings.  Yet at its core, it is about a father trying to return home to his children. When Cobb finally passes through airport security without being arrested, the emotional weight of the ending does not come from the spectacular dreams. It comes from a father finally seeing his children again. 

Interstellar follows a similar pattern.  It takes place across distant planets, collapsing stars and a black hole, but its emotional foundation is the relationship between a father and his daughter. Cooper is trying to save humanity, but he is also desperately trying to keep his promise to Murph: he will return home to her. 

Tenet hides its human story in much the same way. 

On the surface, it is about preventing the end of the world. Underneath that plot, however, it is also about an abused woman trying to reclaim control of her life. 

When the Protagonist, first meets Kat, she is living under the control of her husband, Andrei Sator.  He is using a forged painting—one that Kat mistakenly authenticated as genuine—to blackmail her.   The painting is more than just a plot device. It represents the power Sator holds over her and the shame he uses to keep her trapped. Kat can’t leave because is afraid of losing her son. 

The movie becomes more than just entropy, inversion and preventing a future war. It is also about will Kat escape. 

In the end, the world is saved, but Kat and her son are saved from Sator.

There is an emotionally satisfying element to the film that I feel gets lost with all the plot mechanics. Nolan created a story about time inversion and the fate of humanity but he also created a story about abuse, motherhood and freedom.