Quentin Tarantino’s One-Sentence Review Of Christopher Nolan’s Tenet Is Perfect

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Christopher Nolan is a master at delivering movies that viewers continue to ponder long after the fact, and last year’s Tenet was no exception. In fact, with its use of time inversion, you won’t find any shortage of people who find Tenet the most difficult Nolan movie to follow yet. While fellow filmmaker Quentin Tarantino isn’t necessarily fully in this camp, his one-sentence review definitely makes it clear that he’ll need to re-watch Tenet at some point.

As part of ReelBlend’s exclusive interview with Quentin Tarantino tied to the release of his Once Upon a Time novelization, hosts Sean O’Connell, Jake Hamilton and Kevin McCarthy asked the director what he thought about Tenet, which arrived in theaters last fall. Here’s how Tarantino responded:

I think I need to see it again. (Laughs) I think I need to see it again.

Now to provide full context for those who haven’t listened to the interview, Quentin Tarantino delivered his answer with a hint of sarcasm, and the audience cracked up at his blunt summary of his Tenet experience. Luckily, Tarantino elaborated on why he thinks he’ll need to watch Tenet again, noting how this is the same way he grew to appreciate the full scope of Dunkirk, Nolan’s 2017 movie. As the director put it:

But OK, even that sounds like a cop out, chicken shit answer. And it is, all right. But to be fair, I don't think I really saw Dunkirk until I saw it the third time. I mean, the first time I saw it, I didn't know what to make of it. I enjoyed it, but it was such a big experience that I don't even think I thought of it as a movie. It wasn't until I even saw it the third time that I even realized they were going back in time all the time. I mean, it was just such an overloading, bombastic experience that it took me at least two full times before I could -- into the third time before I could actually see the movie that I was watching, because I was just so dealing with the sensation of it all.

Considering that Tenet literally messes with the flow of time rather than just plays with it in a narrative sense like Dunkirk did, I wouldn’t be surprised if it’ll take Quentin Tarantino more than three watches to completely understand Tenet. Along with sounding off about Christopher Nolan’s latest movie (which made over $363 million worldwide), Tarantino also shared his thoughts on Zack Snyder’s Justice League and more in the ReelBlend interview, which you can listen to below.

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Along with being available on Blu-ray, DVD and Digital HD, Tenet can also be streamed on HBO Max, which you can sign up for using this link. Neither Christopher Nolan nor Quentin Tarantino have announced what their next movie will be (for the latter, it’ll be his final directorial endeavor), but we’ll be sure to let you know once those projects are unveiled.

In the meantime, keep track of what’s heading to theaters in the near future with our 2021 release schedule and 2022 release schedule.

Adam Holmes
Senior Content Producer

Connoisseur of Marvel, DC, Star Wars, John Wick, MonsterVerse and Doctor Who lore, Adam is a Senior Content Producer at CinemaBlend. He started working for the site back in late 2014 writing exclusively comic book movie and TV-related articles, and along with branching out into other genres, he also made the jump to editing. Along with his writing and editing duties, as well as interviewing creative talent from time to time, he also oversees the assignment of movie-related features. He graduated from the University of Oregon with a degree in Journalism, and he’s been sourced numerous times on Wikipedia. He's aware he looks like Harry Potter and Clark Kent.