Movie Review: ‘Tesla’

Review by James Lindorf

Michael Almereyda is probably best known for his adaptation of “Hamlet,” which starred Ethan Hawke, Kyle MacLachlan, and many other big names. He is back for the third time with Hawke as his leading man in “Tesla.” World-renowned inventor Nikola Tesla wasn’t always viewed with such reverence. Tesla fought uphill battles against his rival Thomas Edison (Kyle MacLachlan) to bring his revolutionary electrical system to life. IFC Films will be releasing “Tesla” in limited theaters, on disc, and on streaming platforms August 21st.

There may have never been a more frustrating movie than “Tesla.” There is a ton of talent both in front and behind the camera. Hawke and MacLachlan, along with Jim Gaffigan as George Westinghouse, Donnie Keshawarz, as J.P. Morgan and Eve Hewson as Anne Morgan, all give great performances. The different takes on how these historical events may have occurred allowed the actors to try a wide range of performances. The film is most successful when their performances change as they move from the silliness of Hawke and MacLachlan, assaulting each other with ice cream cones to having serious in-depth discussions about electricity. The low point of the film is pretty much everything else, except for the costuming.

Frequent voice-over, references to Google and other modern technology, do nothing but pull you out of the movie. There is even an unexplainable karaoke scene that distracts from what could have been a beautiful period piece with acting that could earn a nomination or two. I have reviewed dozens of movies that were more inferiorly made to “Tesla.” Those creative teams simply didn’t have the experience or the ability to film, light, or record audio better than they did at that moment. That is not the case here. You can see the potential being wasted in every scene. With every bewildering choice and pretentious decision, the movie became more and more insufferable. However, I can admit that I know that others will react differently to all of these choices and may like or even love it. I simply could never recommend a movie to anyone if I wanted to turn it off from minute 5 until the credits. Nikola Tesla was a brilliant visionary, but Almereyda’s experiment was a failure.

Rating: PG-13 (for some thematic material and nude images)
Genre: Drama
Directed By: Michael Almereyda
Written By: Michael Almereyda
In Theaters: Aug 21, 2020 Limited
On Disc/Streaming: Aug 21, 2020
Runtime: 102 minutes
Studio: IFC Films