Q&A: Nolan and Villeneuve on ‘Tenet’ returning to theaters and why ‘Dune 2’ will be shown on film

UNIVERSAL CITY, Calif. (AP) — Christopher Nolan has, by any account, had a banner year with “Oppenheimer." But “Tenet” was still on his mind.

The palindromic spy thriller starring John David Washington and Robert Pattinson was released at a tricky time during the pandemic, when many theaters were open internationally but not yet in New York and Los Angeles. And all those IMAX 70mm and 70mm film prints, which proved so immensely popular with audiences for “Oppenheimer,” were just sitting around.

Nolan showed one to Warner Bros. film chiefs Pam Abdy and Michael De Luca, and “they got it.”