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Nikola Tesla (Ethan Hawke) works for Thomas Edison (Kyle MacLachlan). He quits accusing Edison of owing him $50k. J.P. Morgan's daughter Anne Morgan (Eve Hewson) is the movie's narrator who is taken with him and his work. He does a business deal with George Westinghouse (Jim Gaffigan) and foolishly rips up their contract for Westinghouse's sake. He falls for actress Sarah Bernhardt (Rebecca Dayan) who is equally fascinated with him.

This is an arthouse bio of legendary inventor Nikola Tesla. Hawke is trying to do quiet intensity. He definitely has the quiet and he gets the intensity at times when he's allowed. This is most notable for its style of fake situations, narration from a side character, and an oddly strip down tone. The combination is interesting but somehow lifeless. Every aspect of this places distance between Tesla and the audience. Then there is the karaoke ending. It's another artistic choice which places a distance between this Tesla from reality and from the audience. It's fascinating but distancing.

Tesla Review

An experimental biopic about the life of Nikola Tesla, his development of the alternate current system, relationship with Thomas Edison, and Anne Morgan, J.P. Morgan's daughter.

Even though I typically dislike biopics and find them uncinematic, I have long waited for a biopic about Nikola Tesla. Having read about Tesla's life through the years, his life story seemed like perfect dramatic material suitable for theatrical film and shockingly has been exploited very little in movies having only been played a few times by Hollywood actors.

Director Michael Almereyda makes a bold experimental move with the film's storytelling, perhaps an attempt to break the wheel of the boring biopic formula. The film acknowledges Nikola Tesla is unsung in history for his scientific contributions and Thomas Edison is the figure of inspiration children tend to learn about in primary schools. The film features a character who is able to momentarily pause the movie, anachronistically use a laptop, look to the camera, and gives a modern commentary like a moderated university lecture.

This self-reflexive narrative style along with its highly digital-looking cinematography makes the film's dramatic scenes feel like transitional re-enactment scenes out of a lifetime documentary. In certain moments, where Ethan Hawke is acting against an obviously back-projected background with a documentary-like voice-over explaining what is happened, they downright are re-enactments.

As Michael Almereyda pushes on further with this chosen off-kilter aesthetic, with its modern commentary gradually becoming more abstract with more interruptions that continually pull you out of the dramatic narrative, the film plays akin to a video art piece on display in a grungy underground art gallery with an alcohol license that is populated with skinny guys with long fringes and eyes in mid-blink standing around girls with multi-colored hair hanging about. The girl then says to you, "It's a great piece, isn't it? Screw Thomas Edison." And you acknowledge towards the display answering, "Yeah, it is great. That darned Thomas Edison."

Ethan Hawke approaches playing Nikola Tesla as how he might be like in person, downplaying the more mythic version of Tesla as a scientific wizard of electricity like David Bowie's version from Christopher Nolan's The Prestige. Hawke's Tesla is a lonely intense man of few words who does not stand out in a crowd. He lives inside his head all day and his imagination is presented as his greatest blessing and curse. The most tragic part is that he battles loneliness to serve all his ideas. Ethan Hawke's performance holds the entire film together through its free-flowing structure.

The cinematography by Sean Price Williams, who previously shot Good Time, was deliberately tight on the actors' faces. Significant moments like the lighting exhibition at Chicago World Fair are glossed over. It makes one wonder if this was all an aesthetic choice or to cover up a lack of budget compared to the grand sweeping historical shots in The Current War. It is disappointing on some level.

That said, I applaud Michael Almereyda's central idea. As a fan of Nikola Tesla, I am endeared by Almereyda's romantic notion and I too would have wished things would have been more fortunate for Nikola Tesla. What if Nikola Tesla had someone helping him financially? What if Nikola Tesla and Thomas Edison worked together? There were hypotheticals I enjoyed entertaining along with this film.

That said, I'd have a hard time recommending Tesla to anybody unless they a) love Nikola Tesla and b) love abstract art. If you do not know a thing about Nikola Tesla and you are watching this movie to learn about him firsthand, Tesla will not teach you anything, at least not directly. I can see normal film audiences calling this pretentious trash. Speaking for myself only, I got the film's message. It said it in a weird way but I like what it had to say.

Title says it all. This was a movie that didn't need to be made, so they "re-imagined" history to make it more compelling. Only it wasn't more compelling, it simply was irritating.

I looked forward to learning a little about Nikola Tesla, the inventor moved into the shadows of people like Edison and Westinghouse by history. Instead, I got a pretentious muddle of history and fantasy given in an underlit and murky tableau that's as dull as the narrative.

Ethan Hawke plays Tesla (sans accent) as if sleepwalking. But it doesn'r matter because the story has nothing to tell us anyway. We get disjointed scenes that depict this and that, some historical and some made up. They add up to not much of anything. The "device" of throwing in anachronistic touches (Google, cell phone, Coca Cola, etc) backfire. But the major atrocity is when Hawke's Tesla picks up a microphone and starts a karaoke session of "Everybody Wants to Rule the Word."

Avoid this garbage and spend your time reading the Wikipedia article on Tesla.

This movie doesn't know what it wanted to be, and in the end it has hardly anything to do with the real Nikola Tesla. The movie tries to be artistic but is just mess.

This is not a historical film. Yes, it is about Tesla and his interactions with his contemporaries. Yet, it is about his visions and aspirations through the eyes of outsiders.

Anachronism is at its highest. So, it may feel unrealistic, but the director has no claims otherwise.

The narration is not linear, it is quite fragmented.

It is an interesting introduction to Tesla and his vision/dream for the future.

Stated as a freewheeling story on Tesla, this is a degrading and dark interpretation of his life, with very little shown of his inventions and how he was done in by his peers and investors.

There have been quite a few films and documentaries on Tesla's life which were enlightening and described what he was possibly trying to achieve, but this film is just a mockery of his life.

Tesla was an eccentric and introverted person which unfortunately led to his downfall. Had he been more forceful, he could possible have changed the world.

A lot of people did not like the choices in this film. The style is almost surrealist, art house, than a typical biography film. I was really was engaged by the exploration of the genre. It was intentional choices, not a slip up or a result of bad acting or sloppy direction but it does come down to effectiveness. Did the style and the experiment fit the content or what people wanted from the film? I think it didn't quite fit. However, it was a marvelous attempt and and the acting was phenomenal. There were some genius moments but it's my opinion that the ending was the weakest segment of the film.

This biopic was one of my most anticipated of 2020. Sadly, it is as dull as a Wikipedia entry... sprinkled with two scenes of anachronistic music and a secondary character reciting Google search statistics. Yes, you read that correctly. Ethan Hawke is as reliable as they come... but even his talents are insufficient in bringing this dead script to life. No Spark Whatsoever.

I think the authors wanted to present Nikola Tesla as an unknowable, distanced,ingenious man, and in my opinion, they succeeded. The audience ( wider) did not recognize that. As an ordinary spectator, therby Serbian by origin, I am more than pleased with this movie.

It's a random girl telling you how many searches "Tesla" or "Edison" has on Google. Then a silent Ethan Hawke staring at lightening for the rest of the movie

This is not a straight forward biography. It is more like a "Theatre Play" being acted on the Big Screen. That is why I loved it. Of course it isn't perfect and some of the scenes could have been avoided. But overall this is a very satisfying film to watch. I think the film with its staggered and confusing narrative is an Ideal depiction of what was going on in Tesla's Mind.

"Tesla" is a Drama movie in which we watch the life of Nikola Tesla from a different perspective and we follow his life choices through time. There is also a reference on his interactions with Thomas Edison, J. P. Morgan and his daughter Anne Morgan.

I have to admit that I expected something different than this since this movie is supposed to be a biography. I am not saying that it's a bad movie but I don't think that is a masterpiece. I was disappointed by the result because I had high expectations from it but I found interesting its perspective and the direction which was made by Michael Almereyda who tried to make it more artistic. Regarding the interpretation of Ethan Hawke who played as Nikola Tesla I have to say that I liked it but I am sure that if this movie was an original biography movie then Ethan Hawke would elevate it.

Looks like most of the movie cost went to the actors and not the production. Very poor production and very thin story line

My favorite part in this "biography period piece" was when a girl turns to the camera and said "if you google..." - it's my favorite part because that's when I shut it off.

The film is very confusing. I can't really follow the story, because it has a lot of seemingly irrelevant shots or fantasy shots - I can't really tell. I was genuinely bored by "Tesla". "The Current War" is a way better film. Watch that one instead.

Its disjointed, it offers details, few, and these are shown with ,,personal,, impressions. there is no magic though science must have been impressing back then in its fast evolution. its a mess. a documentary is the better choice.

The problem with being much anticipated is that you have to deliver, to an extent at least. This movie delivers almost nothing. Not enough real history and character involvement to deliver any interest in the "current war" that the plot hinges on. Then there is Ethan Hawkes wooden performance, except when he does a rendition of a Tears for Fears song (in character) into a microphone against an soft focus sunset backdrop. If you find you can't sit through this bore of a movie but want to catch that music video, fast forward to the 90 minute mark.

Assertive, quirky and fresh; "Tesla" proves that biopics don't need to go by the book.

A stylistic drama based on the true story of visionary inventor Nikola Tesla and his breakthroughs in transmitting electrical power and light.

Writer/director Michael Almereyda's approach to Tesla's story is quite fascinating. It's a feast for the eyes, quite funny and well acted. Ethan Hawke dazzles as Tesla, Eve Hewson is sensational as Anne Morgan but the real scene stealer is Kyle MacLaclan as Thomas Edison. There's never an instant where he isn't in a scene that won't make you chuckle. A real gem of a biopic that is worth seeing. One of the final sequences in the film will have you howling. Stream it now to rent or buy.

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Did Edison make this movie? Is this a biogarphy or a parody?

Watching it felt more like a stage play than a film. Honestly didn't expect to get through the full movie but I eventually got interested. It's a fun way to do biopic, and I'd love to see this style utilized in the future. Somehow Almereyda made this film softly touch on the craziness that is 2020 which I appreciated as it is very subtle rather than explicit. It's the kind of film where you just have to sit and watch, if you expect something out of the film or spend the whole time microanalyzing you probably won't like it

... with a musk reminiscent of burning flesh, transformed into a ridiculously low budget AmDram production performed by clowns and jesters, mercilessly mocking one of the founding fathers of modern technology.

Fuses blown, breakers tripped, a complete short circuit fiasco.

I see why most of the people here are disappointed. This is not any of the conventional or orthodox cinematic experience one expect for a movie subsumed into the genre of "Biography". However, I've enjoyed it precisely because of this.

It's experimental, highly theatrical and full of irony. It's Brechtian in the sense that keeps you constantly aware of it's unrealisticity. It's Brechtian in the sense that it mocks the genius of people wanting to change the world while strengthening the very foundations of the system that governs it. It's Brechtian in the sense that it asks the question "What keeps the mankind alive?" and answers "Its foolishness, even among its most prominent geniuses".

Both the monologues and the dialogues are marvellous. The script as a whole is one of high elegance and precision without leaving aside the need for a pinch of absurdity. Both the scenography and acting are highly theatrical. The cinematography is following the classical approaches while merging with the preceding two, thus creating a feeling of proximity and remoteness at once.

In general - the overall rating here for me is quite beneath what this piece truly deserves.

Go watch it, I don't believe you will regret.

"Every human being is an engine geared to the wheelwork of the universe." Reunites the director with his Hamlet (2000). Michael Almereyda's film, a signature blending of style and formats. The avant-garde biopic sidestepping declassified documents altogether. Ethan Hawke's performance resembling that of a silent movie star.

Nikola Tesla give world the great gift - Electric power. He was son of Serbian Ortodox Priest. Remmember that. This film is pure waste of time. Seriae with Rade Serbedzija, filmed in 1977, is better.