'Tenet' Is About the Power of Friendship

As a time travel heist, it's a head scrambler. As a bromance, it's perfect.

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It’s an unfortunate fact of life that just because something is cliche doesn’t mean it’s wrong. “It’s not the amount of years in your life, it’s the amount of life in your years,” “People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care” and other palindromatic truisms may spring from the same Live Laugh Love well that gave us “God helps those who help themselves,” but they’re true! Or, at least, they’re true enough that you can use them as a good “when in doubt…” rule of thumb. 

I was thinking about this because I rewatched Tenet in IMAX a few days back and I think that movie is about the power of friendship. “The power of friendship!” Has anything ever been more cliche than waxing about the power of friendship? But watching Tenet? In IMAX? Bro, let me tell you, I believed in the power of friendship. I think we all should.

I’m writing this mostly with male friendship in mind for a few reasons. First, because it’s the friendship space I’ve got the most familiarity with. Second, because in my experience, women are quite a bit better at friendship than men are. Very few women need to be convinced of the power of friendship. Meanwhile, I think most men tend to think of friends a group of guys you can grab a beer and watch the game with, but not necessarily people to rely on, expect anything meaningful from or, God forbid, say “I love you” to. Men, as a general rule, do not believe in the power of friendship.

I think giving up on the power of friendship has been the source of a lot of pain in our country. And I’m glad Nolan is out there, trying to remind us of just how powerful friendship can be. Call me cringe if you must!