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Memento
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Director: Christopher Nolan
Starring: Guy Pearce, Carrie-Anne Moss, Joe Pantoliano
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We all have those days when we forget things. The strange memory blanks that suddenly hit us mid sentence. But for Lenny Shelby, it's different. He can't form new memories at all. And how do you know who you are when you can't remember?
This is the premise of British director Christopher Nolan's stunningly original Memento, one of the most thought-provoking, engaging and thrillingly intelligent films to be released last year. The follow-up to his low-budget debut Following (1999), Memento is a technical and imaginative tour-de-force that wrenches you from your normal popcorn slouch and demands attention; this is a film that makes you work and makes you think, and one which, unlike Lenny, you won't forget in a hurry.
The opening image - a Polaroid developing in reverse, the image slowly fading into obscurity - is a perfect metaphor for a film which thrives on the development and unravelling of narrative clues, in which the story is slowly pieced together scene by scene only to unwind with each new revelation. We learn that Lenny (Guy Pearce) is chasing the killer of his wife, the incident in which Lenny also sustained the head injuries which caused his "condition". A cop, Teddy (Joe Pantoliano) and a waitress, Natalie (Carrie Anne Moss) are helping him. And somehow, Lenny is mixed up in a murder. Essentially running backwards, the film's end at the beginning only makes sense once the whole story has unfolded; each scene plays out with Lenny reconstructing the development of events for himself from scribbled notes, photos, maps and clues, only for the next scene to jump back and relate the events which led up to it.
This framework of constant revisitation, revision and reconstruction implicates the viewer in Lenny's point of view: as he pieces events together so, gradually, do we, never fully knowing the full story, and more importantly, never completely knowing what Lenny has done and who he can trust. The film is a kind of narrative test of alertness; visual clues - the scratches on Lenny's cheek, the smashed window of his car, the comments on his Polaroid pictures, his "memento" tattoos, the elusive "Sammy Jankis" parallel story - hint at the order of events but ensure that the solution, like the identity of the killer, lies tantalisingly out of reach right up to the end.
Memento is a skewed noir mystery at heart, peopled by manipulative femmes fatales and low-down lowlifes, whose visual settings - diners, car-lots, beaten-up motels - and set-pieces (including a chase scene in which Lenny forgets who is chasing who) conjure the film's downbeat, hardboiled feel. Essentially a story of self-delusion, loss and the untrustworthiness of memory, the real villain of the piece is stagnation, of the inability to move on, of constantly being stuck between two places; Lenny's desire for revenge is driven by the murder of his wife but also the theft of his identity, the sense of who he is and how he relates to the world around. He exists, ironically, only in memory, in the happy time preceding his wife's murder, the world now like a half-glimpsed dream never fully understood.
Nolan doesn't shy away from the comic potential of Lenny's condition, nor its capacity for tenderness and pathos, and the downbeat conclusion in an isolated outhouse (well, this is a noir film, after all) where Lenny finally catches up to the truth, leaves the answers suitably open-ended. Meanwhile the leads, especially Guy Pearce, deliver excellent performances which root the story in much-needed dramatic ground.
By turns confusing, enthralling and frustrating, Memento revels in teasing and misleading its audience, a film that for once assumes we possess a degree of intelligence and can be bothered to use it. Stay on your toes, ladies and gents, you're going to need your wits about you: but Memento is more than worth the effort you put in.
Reviewed by Oliver Berry
Reader comments about Memento
Sigal (sigal_i@hotmail.com) writes:
BRILLIANT, brilliant film. Very very smart and moving. A kind of film that when you leave the cinema, you kind of wish you were a film director yourself, and made these kinds of movies yourself. Also makes you feel like you would have liked to know its director and script writer.
choey (Email address withheld) writes:
I absolutely agree with the above post. That film make me want to direct something too! I would definitely like to check out Mr. Nolan's previous work..
RL (Email address withheld) writes:
You either love it or hate it. If you love it, buy the DVD and study it (especially for those hidden scenes). It may be too much for some - a local video store said to me that some people demanded their money back! If you loved "Armageddon", you'll probably hate Memento, because you're not spoon-fed anything - you must think to enjoy it.
Derek Baldwin (DJBNJB@aol.com) writes:
Not much to add to the above really though I detect a slight breathlessness to the comments. It's not half as profound as the director might have liked to think it was. Even so a very worthwhile film and cleverly done.
Laura Morris (Email address withheld) writes:
I really enjoyed Memento although I had to Look up the plot afterwards as it is very confusing! Guy Pearce was brilliant.
Elizabeth (Email address withheld) writes:
Well, an intelligent film with an equally intelligent narrative. Nice to see a decent, thought-provoking film come out of America for a change. And remember. It's not a story - don't treat it as one.
Cole (Email address withheld) writes:
Well Memento is indeed an amazing film, trying to keep on the topic i have been asked ot write a 800-1000 word essay on the narrative so far proving difficult!
Scott P (Email address withheld) writes:
Original film, their's a first. Originality: Risk, Risk: Chance, Chance: Memento, Memento: Brilliant, honestly I understood it first time round, and its the type of film that need's two viewings, like The Usual Suspects. It is still utterly fantastic and Guy Pearce deserves more than the small credit he receives, Joe Pantoliano continues unnoticed and Carrie Anne-Moss is fast becoming a Hollywood Idol. The idea of reversing the story, scene by scene, is ideal. And the whole thing makes your head spin, of you don't concentrate. All in All: Supoib!
Footnote: SupOIb is not a spelling error by me. And Baldwin, here me now, you should never of spoke bad of Platoon!
DanUK (Email address withheld) writes:
Watched this last night with my girlfriend and we had a right old debate afterwards.
Did Natalie use Lenny to kill Teddy because of what happened to Jimmy? That's the way it seemed to me. Or did she genuinely want to help Lenny in the end?
I need to watch it again really! Superb acting from Guy Pearce all the way through.
RAVI (ravi_rockv@rediffmail.com) writes:
Although the movie wasnt as clear(atleast to me)though it seemed as if i was waiting for such a kind for years!Guy has excelled.if anyone understood the whole movie(each and every part of it) i just want to congratulate him/her and plz do mail the essence of it to me .....
(Email address withheld) writes:
A friend told me to watch this movie and I looked forward to it, and when I spotted it on cinemax, I sat there and watched, amazed at its director's control over his material. I guess that in a movie so convoluted as this, some mistakes might be lurking somewhere for the right viewer, but i tend to forget that.
strange to think, too, that this film concerned mainl,y with oblivion, must have been made by a director with a very sharp memory (and a host of continuity guys).
in the end, i stuck to the wonders of finding out the "truth" about Lenny, but, strangely enough, I felt I had seen soimething more like a shell, with few fleshy things inside. Anyhow, I am amazed and grateful for this movie.
Adam (Email address withheld) writes:
Phenomenal movie. No real plot holes, even the scene where his wife is lying next to him while he is covered in the tattoos makes sense - the last thing he remembers is that she was raped and murdered, so unless she spends every moment keeping his attention, he forgets she is alive, and reverts to his only means of keeping necessary info, tattoos. His condition is something that he is constantly AWARE of, not something he may forget.
This movie is best seen twice, and even viewing it backwards (via DVD) is very enjoyable watching unfold in the traditional way.
MJ Blount (wetwillysback@hotmail.com) writes:
I saw Memento recently and i loved it. The plot was ingenius and Guy peace was great. I was expecting to be more confused than i was at first, but i understood it quite quickly. The Sammi Jankis story was v. interesting and enjoyable.
I am hoping to get it on DVD soon and need to see it a second time.
DAK (Email address withheld) writes:
I'm not sure about this film. It certainly makes the viewer think about what's going on. As for plot holes: how on earth can a man who has lost his short term memory keep on remembering to have a look in his pockets for his pictorial photobook.
zoli (zolita@freemail.hu) writes:
Very interesting film. The scene where his wife is lying next to him, there is a tatoo "I've done it" on him, I noticed it today...so, his wife survived? please email your version. thank you very much.
experiment 019 (Email address withheld) writes:
One of the coolest and most thought provoking films i ever seen. It can get confusing so you might have to watch it over again from beginning to ending (or ending to beginning as the case may be). Guy was great. Everytime i see this movie it reminds me of the very first Silent Hill videogame for some reason, maybe that's one of the reasons why i liked this movie so much. Anyway, damn good movie Mr. Nolan.
JULIO (Email address withheld) writes:
Great,great movie. I want to see it reversed, to check if i have missed something. The director and the actors are superb. Go on, Mr Nolan, please keep on making movies. Thank you, Adam (previous comments), now I understand the scene of Guy lying in bed with his wife. Anyway, ¿why has he tattoed the sentence "I HAVE DONE IT" in his chest (I mean, why those words precisely?)
Sean (emperorminguk@yahoo.co.uk) writes:
Buy the DVD watch it in it's original format, piece together as much as you can and then accept you still don't really fully get it. Think about it, talk about it for a day or two and accept you still don't really fully get it. Now acces your hidden feature and watch it in chronological order and accept that this film is one in a million. Thought provoking, intense and spectular leaving you with an ultimate realisation that now you really get it and understand exactly just what Lenny's actually done.
juan (Email address withheld) writes:
A CITIZEN KANE of a film for now,such imagination ,acting and style, forget his BATMAN film, see this and INSOMNIA, and lets have more thought provoking film making in the future.
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