· · ·
turning to page one
turning to page one
Tenet · written by Christopher Nolan · 2020
Scene 110 of 275 · ≈ 1 min on screen · Act two
An unnamed intelligence operative, recruited into a shadow war fought through time-inverted weapons and objects, teams with an enigmatic ally to stop a dying Russian oligarch from using technology gifted by a dying future to erase the present.
The Protagonist in his zone of comfort — a skilled, anonymous field operative, competent and confident inside the Kiev operation.
Broken by torture and 'killed,' he needs a new purpose; Fay offers one that transcends the nation-state loyalties that just got his team killed.
He enters the wholly unfamiliar situation of Tenet — the wind turbine, the password test, and Barbara's proof that time itself can run backward.
The Protagonist begins surveilling Kat at her son's school gates — he commits to using her marriage against Sator, entering the upside-down world of the operation proper.
Kat's appraisal-room scene with the forged Goya begins the relationship — with Kat, and by extension her son Max — that will carry the story's theme of what a parent will do to save a child.
They lie low, reassembling their lockpick documents as first responders arrive.
Neil confirms the heist crew escaped clean; the Protagonist reveals a 'temporal cold war' and fully recruits Neil.
Priya explains the reversed round the Protagonist recovered came from a 'turnstile' Sator was given by the future.
This scene
They walk, BODYGUARDS at a discreet distance.
PRIYA
Have you met him?
PROTAGONIST
I was close.
PRIYA
Get closer.
PROTAGONIST
I’ve been compromised. Unless that
antagonist was a coincidence.
PRIYA
The wife set you up?
PROTAGONIST
Maybe. There’s a good chance I get
killed as soon as I go back in.
PRIYA
This was always a suicide mission –
that’s why they recruited a corpse.
PROTAGONIST
Who did? Who are we working for?
PRIYA
Everyone. Survival. You need more,
consider yourself working for me.
PROTAGONIST
Well, Boss, I need a way to
succeed.
Priya thinks. Looks at the Protagonist. Deciding.
PRIYA
What if you have something he
needs?
PROTAGONIST
Such as?
PRIYA
Plutonium 241. Sator tried to lift
the only loose 241 from under a CIA
team at the opera siege in Kiev. He
got the team, but not the 241.
PROTAGONIST
Who did?
PRIYA
Ukrainian security services. It’s
moving through Tallinn in a week.
PROTAGONIST
Helping an arms dealer steal
weapons-grade plutonium is
unacceptable. I’m just gonna take
him out.
PRIYA
No. Sator has to stay alive until
we know his part in things.
Leverage the situation without
losing control of the 241.
PROTAGONIST
PRIYA
A terrorist bomb, even one that
kills millions, is nothing compared
with what happens if we don’t stop
Sator.
PROTAGONIST
From. Doing. What?
Priya looks up the road at the cars STREAMING past...
PRIYA
We’re being attacked. Not by
terrorists or rogue states...
PROTAGONIST
Who, then?
PRIYA
We’re being attacked by the future.
And we’re fighting over time.
PROTAGONIST
Time?
PRIYA
Theirs is running out, so they’re
coming for ours. And Sator is
helping. You have to find out how.