A scene from Tenet features the protagonist (left) and Neil. [Photo/Douban]

"It seems all the characters are just tools the director uses to accomplish the mission in the script," reads one Weibo user's highly-upvoted comment under a review.

"Despite an extremely meticulous script, the film only looks like a carefully built facade," wrote film critic Wen Bai on Paper Bullets, a film blog based on WeChat. "It fails to show the reasons behind the characters' relationships and conflicts, making it hard for viewers to strike a sympathetic chord with them."

Despite all that, Tenet has attracted a fair amount of rave reviews, mostly for the stunning, hard-to-forget visual experiences.

The visual effects in Tenet have been hailed as "the best yet of the director's filmography".

"With a time-bending narrative, the film has created visual spectacles shattering our perception of things!" reads a review published on j-movie, a popular film blog on multiple social platforms.