Review of Memento (2000) by Vguru R — 31 Oct 2014

Ever go to see a movie and suddenly find yourself watching the film backwards? Seems like a weird question, but that in fact was the case for Christopher Nolan's second film MEMENTO, based off the short story Memento Mori (which is actually written by the former's brother, Jonathan Nolan). The special case with Memento is that it is built on TWO timelines: a COLOR sequence, in which all scenes are placed in reverse order, and a BLACK & WHITE sequence, in which all scenes are placed in regular order. The sequences alternate throughout the film (meaning we have Color, then B/W, then Color again), starting off with the Color Sequence showing a reverse murder. Memento revolves around a man, Leonard Shelby (Guy Pearce), suffering from anterograde amnesia while searching for the man who raped and murdered his wife. Anterograde amnesia is a form of memory loss in which the patient CANNOT recreate new memories, therefore in the film Leonard uses a series of Polaroids and tattoos to give himself clues and remind him of the search. All he remembers is everything preceding the incident that caused the memory loss. Nolan amazingly directed this extremely engaging neo-noir story about a man trying to kill someone, even though the man forgets half the time that's he's trying to do just that in the first place. Also, for those who might think that using those two timelines would be confusing, they actually aren't and rather add an extra layer of mystery toward the characters-at "Point A" you believe in certain facts that the film has set up for you; by "Point Z" your whole perception of Memento has completely changed, the film having done some kind of backflip on you. Which leads me to talk about the ending... Oh I really wish. That gets into SPOILER territory, but it is an astounding conclusion.

All performances are great especially from Pearce, this is one of the best of his career (can't forget L.A. Confidential though). However the standout, in my opinion, is actually Carrie Anne Moss. That might come across as a surprise to some people, but her portrayal of Natalie is quite possibly the best performance of her career (as of now it's tied with Trinity from The Matrix for me). Joe Pantoliano also stars and is awesome as well, but a fun fact about him and Memento: in the opening scene, Nolan had actually re-recorded one of Pantoliano's lines because he thought it had originally sounded weird and wanted to take it out of the film.

My only negative about Memento would have to be that most of the B&W scenes are mainly exposition, although it can be ignored for the most part since a particular story told in that timeline ties in with the ending later on. All in all I believe Memento is a fantastic psychological thriller, and while only being Nolan's second film he once again increased the scope and set out again with high ambitions. This is my second favorite film of Nolan's career, and I contend that it's also one of the best psychological thrillers of the 2000's - 9.9/10.