This film is like a jigsaw puzzle, you have to connect the pieces together. It goes away from the standard linear approach and became something more interesting than we expected. Memento starring Guy Pearce, Carrie-Anne Moss and Joe Pantoliano. Directed by Christopher Nolan.
What's it about?
Memento is all about a man named Leonard Shelby (Guy Pearce) who is seeking for revenge for the rape and murder of his wife. But there's just on little thing that's getting in the way, he has a condition called anterograde amnesia which impairs his ability to store new explicit memories. This is also portrayed throughout the film as it has two different sequences. A series of black & white scenes that are in chronological order, and a coloured one that is in reverse order. The two sequences meet at the end to produce one common story. Throughout the film, we see his struggles in dealing with his condition and the dilemma of who to trust. In order to keep track on the trail of his wife's murderer, he tattoos information on his body so he wouldn't forget them. He also keeps photos of various objects/people so that he would know their value to him. The closer he gets to the trail, the more secrets he finds out about people that surrounds him, and the true nature of himself.
What I thought:
To be honest, the first time I saw this film I was a little puzzled because there were so many pieces of information to be pieced together that I missed/forgot some of them so I watched it again for the second time straight away. I'm glad I did it as I really appreciated the beauty of this film. Very seldom will you see a film like this. It has 2 different sequences of scenes that have different order. You can truly experience what the main character is experiencing as the scenes just jump from one scene to another, creating that amnesia type of feel. You empathise with his situation but the more you watch the film, the more twists you find out about him and the lies of people close to him to take advantage of his condition. The film is not action packed but is more story based. It relies on its unique form of story telling to capture the audience's attention and take them for one hell of a ride. All the actors were magnificent and delivered a stellar job as what you would expect from a Nolan film.
Conclusion:
Memento is a unique form of story telling that will make you a little bit puzzled at first, but once you fit all the pieces together, you will come up with a wonderful story that is very well made and acted. I recommend this to everyone that loves psychological thrillers as it wouldn't disappoint. This is one of Christopher Nolan's early works, so if you're a fan of him, this is a must watch!
Grade:
85/100 HD
-Russel
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