Christopher Nolan’s films have become such an event that even the teasers and trailers are treated with the same excitement as an actual premiere. The secrecy around his latest project, Tenet, is so great that the first teaser—which debuted in theaters over the summer—was never officially released online. All of which is to say that we’re ridiculously excited that the first full trailer has finally arrived.
The trailer for Tenet seems to—at least somewhat—confirm previous speculation about the usage of time, particularly in a few shots where things move forward and backward (that car chase at the end!). Beyond that, the trailer doesn’t offer too much in the way of plot, though there is a rather intriguing moment when Martin Donovan’s character welcomes John David Washington “to the afterlife,” and there’s reference of a mission to save the world from something worse than nuclear holocaust.
In a new interview with Entertainment Weekly, the filmmaker described Tenet as his “most ambitious film” to date. Shot in seven countries, Tenet has, up until now, only been described as “an action epic evolving from the world of espionage.” The scarcity of details has led many to speculate about what tricks Nolan might have up his sleeve this time around. For his part, the filmmaker says he’s using the espionage genre as a “jumping off point,” and “crossing a few different genres in a hopefully exciting and fresh way.” Tenet also stars Robert Pattinson, Elizabeth Debicki, and Michael Caine, and hits theaters on July 17, 2020.