TESLA
A compelling but strange inventor’s story for teens and adults.
Should You Watch It?
TESLA is very entertaining, and its superb acting gives this tragic tale of genius real weight. The film presents Nikola Tesla as an inventor caught between brilliant ideas, business interests, and his desire to help others. Its surrealistic European style makes the biography unusual rather than routine.
That strangeness is also the cost. Tesla remains brooding and distant, with little character development. The movie takes jabs at capitalism while also extolling it, hints at paranormal activity without developing it, and ends with Tesla singing a modern song in a very strange scene. There are also a few profanities, some sensuality, and morbid discussions of death.
If you are a teenager or adult who can engage a curious, ambiguous film with discernment, take the trip; younger children should choose something else.
The Story
NO SPOILERS — WE KEEP THE SURPRISESNikola Tesla is a brilliant inventor pursuing new possibilities with electricity. The film begins with Tesla experiencing electricity while petting a black cat, then moves back to his arrival in America and his work with Thomas Edison.
After leaving Edison, Tesla struggles financially before forming a partnership with George Westinghouse to develop alternating current. Their work leads toward the Chicago World’s Fair, while Tesla continues pursuing ideas that could transform communication and power.
Is It Any Good?
Three stars means TESLA is very entertaining and well acted, though its unusual style and limited character development keep it from becoming a great film.
The acting is superb. The movie offers a fairly linear biographical plot, but it is presented in a surrealistic European style filled with suggestions that are not always clearly developed. Tesla himself is too brooding and monochromatic, always seeming distant. The modern song at the end is especially strange, and another scene includes profanity.
The Worldview
TESLA presents a light pagan worldview with spiritualist elements, alongside both capitalist and anti-capitalist ideas. It also includes ill-defined possible occult elements and lots of humanist content. The film hints at ghosts and paranormal activity but never fully develops those ideas. It likewise hints at sexual promiscuity without developing that theme.
The movie portrays Edison and Westinghouse as men who combine invention with business, while Tesla is shown as a brilliant mind who wants to do good for others but lacks business and economic sense. Its treatment of capitalism is ambivalent: the film takes several jabs at it but also extols it. Since the movie is so ambiguous, viewers can read into it what they want.
The film’s central tension concerns brilliant human ideas, power, money, and the desire to benefit others. Scripture asks a searching question about what ultimately matters: “For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul?” (Matthew 16:26, ESV)
The Content Guide
The specifics — spoilers included by nature — so you can judge for your own family.
Dominant Worldview and Other Worldview Content/Elements
Light pagan worldview with some spiritualist elements, some capitalist and some anti-capitalist elements, and some ill-defined, possible occult elements, plus lots of humanist content
Foul Language
No foul language until an outburst in one scene of two GDs and an obscenity
Violence
Discussion of a best friend drowning when Thomas Edison was 5-years-old and Tesla’s brother drowning when he was 12-years-old, strange ice cream fantasy fight between Tesla and Edison
Sex
No sex, but Sarah Bernhardt character is sexually provocative
Nudity
Sarah Bernhardt is portrayed in a very see-through dress onstage, and a nude classical painting
Alcohol Use
Minor alcohol use
Smoking and/or Drug Use and Abuse
Smoking and no drugs;
Miscellaneous Immorality
Strange statement from Tesla that he’s getting signals from Mars, and Westinghouse cheats Tesla.
Talk About It
Questions for the drive home, the dinner table, or the youth group.
Tesla wants his inventions to benefit others, while others see their financial value. How should Christians think about using gifts for service rather than status or profit?
1 Peter 4:10 · Philippians 2:3–4The film presents both criticism and praise of capitalism. What makes the pursuit of money helpful, and what makes it spiritually dangerous?
1 Timothy 6:9–10 · Matthew 6:24Tesla’s ideas are sometimes treated as more important than ordinary relationships. How can ambition become isolating, and what does love require of us?
1 Corinthians 13:1–3 · Romans 12:10The movie hints at spiritual and paranormal ideas without clearly developing them. How should Christians test spiritual claims?
1 John 4:1 · Acts 17:11The Final Word
TESLA offers superb acting and a fascinating, tragic portrait of genius, but its surreal style, ambiguous worldview, sensuality, profanity, and morbid discussions call for discernment. For teenagers and adults, it is WORTH THE TRIP — TEENS AND ADULTS. Younger children should choose something else.
