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Tenet · written by Christopher Nolan · 2020
Scene 196 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.
Mumbai, London, Oslo, and Amalfi — he adapts to the world of inverted physics and Sator's inner circle, paying costs (Kat's trust, his own safety) to get close to the target.
The Tallinn ambush succeeds — he gets what the mission wanted, extracting the plutonium '241' from the armored convoy.
He pays a heavy price for it — Kat is shot, the material is lost to Sator anyway, and he is left not knowing whether any of it mattered.
Priya reveals the algorithm was split into nine pieces by a guilt-ridden future scientist and hidden in nuclear sites; the Protagonist demands Kat and Max's safety in exchange for letting the plan play out.
Chinooks and an icebreaker gather Tenet's forces for the coming operation.
The inverted Protagonist exercises aboard the icebreaker.
This scene
The Protagonist watches a CHINOOK long-line a container...
PRIYA (V.O.)
Fighting fire with fire is a
treacherous business, but there are
people in the future who need us to
continue the algorithm’s journey
into the past. You see...
Taking a look at the sea CHURNING BACKWARDS into the stern as the inverted ship ‘progresses’, he heads below deck...
CUT BACK TO PRIYA IN OSLO –
PRIYA
...Tenet wasn’t founded in the past
– it will be founded in the future.