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A_Ratliff [ 10.0 ]
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The underused Guy Pearce stars in his best performance yet as a vengeful man with no short-term memory in "Memento". Were this presented as a standard thriller, "Memento" would not receive such a high rating, although it would still be a strong movie due to the presence of such fine performers as Pearce, Carrie-Anne Moss, and the wonderful Joe Pantoliano. The movie's strength, its brilliance, is how Christopher Nolan structures the film. The familiar elements of your standard film noir are present, but, besides being present alongside such a wonderful premise, they're structured brilliantly. The movie is told from end to beginning instead of the reverse. Instead of getting from point A to point B as in 99.9% of movies, we go from point B back to point A, and subsequently see each scene explain the preceding one. This sets itself up for a brilliant ending--or is it a beginning? Either way, "Memento" is a fine film, certainly one of the best, if not THE best, of the year.
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Adam23 [ 9.5 ]
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This movie is a real treat. Every scene changes your opinion of the characters. You are constantly trying to figure out who is the "good guy" and who is the "bad guy". In the end the tell us who the so called good and bad guys are, but then you still aren't really sure of what just happened. It keeps you on your toes while entertaining your senses, that is all you can ask for in a movie.
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mingle [ 9.0 ]
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This is one of the ultimate high concept movies. The story concerns a man whose wife was raped and murdered in their own home. In the process of trying to defend her, the man is injured and loses the ability to form new memories. He gets to keep all the ones he had before his wife was murdered, but now can't remember things as basic as which car is his own or where he is staying. Now, his sole purpose in life is to track down and kill the man who murdered his wife. This all leads to a brilliant examination of how memories are stored and formed and the essential unreliability of memory for everyone. The lead character is forced to take pictures of many important things to him (people, places, cars) and then to make notes on them to himself so that he will know one from the other. The frightening aspect comes about when he writes judgment calls on his pictues such as who he should trust, and who might be the killer. At some point the man even resorts to tatooing facts on his body about the murderer.
What this movie demonstrates is the essential unreliability of memory. As we see a more detailed examination of the lead character as the story progresses we see that he and his memory are being manipulated, but we cannot know by whom or for what purpose. As the movie delves deeper into the formation of new memories, it forces the audience to think about the reliability of their own carefully created memories.
All of this would make for an already briliant movie. What brings this movie into a new realm is the style in which it was shot. Since the lead character cannot remember what happened to him 5 minutes before, neither can we as the audience. This is what really forces us to think about our own memories. The movie is shot with the last scene shown first. Then the scene before is shot, etc. This technique is both brilliant and confusing, forcing the audience to actually think and (gasp) be lost for a time. The movie forces you to think, as we see people whom the lead has been trusting manipulate him outright, knowing he will not be able to remember their bald attempts at gratifying their needs by using him. Despite the reverse direction of the movie, everything is not clear until the end. This is the kind of movie which should be savored and considered for several hours and days afterwards in order to fully realize the director's (also the writer, in this case) intent.
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Icantsleep [ 8.5 ]
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So can someone please explain this movie:
1) In the flashback/flashforward that showed Leonard, with his wife sleeping next to him, he was also sporting a Tatoo that said "I've done it". So, did Leonard really kill the true rapist, like Teddy said? (Is Leonard's wife dead?)
2) How did Jimmy G know Leonard? Jimmy says "hey memory man".
3) Why did Leonard write down Teddy's license plate number? Was it just to give his life purpose, to mold facts to allow him to continue (like Teddy said)?
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shanster [ 6.0 ]
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Interesting, to echo JD. Kind of an empty feeling at the end, but I knew it was a cool concept. I like to have the "oh I see" revelation, which this one really doesn't give. If you check out the Imdb, you will find that the infinite number of monkeys have banged their keyboards with infinite opinions and unanswered questions about this movie, which means we are not alone in asking...What was that all about?
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chapter11 [ 9.5 ]
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Beautiful, labyrinthine midfuckery of the highest order; i understand that it's easy to overestimate Christopher Nolan at this point in his career, what with a nation of fanboys soaking their jeans over "The Dark Knight" (myself included), but i'm not so sure he's anything other than populist filmmaking's great white hope. But yeah, "Memento"-- just a beacon of impeccable craft, a movie that's only confusing if you don't give it your undivided attention. That a film can be this complicated and yet this satisfying is pretty miraculous, i think.
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kcremer [ 8.5 ]
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WOW!!!
This movie was a real test of my attention span and ability to remember small details. The story is told backwards, which you may or may not already know (well, the scenes in color are; there are black and white scenes that are told in regular time, and they alternate with the backwards color scenes). It confused me a little, but I really like the idea.
The story is about a man named Leonard (Guy Pierce) who suffered a brain injury after being assaulted by a man who then killed his wife (this is what he believes or wants us to believe) and left him with short term memory loss. We hear through Leonard's constant narration that he remembers who he is and what he knew and has done prior to the accident, but forgets any information he obtains after the fact. He becomes obsessed with solving his wife's "murder", but has to tattoo important information onto his body and take pictures of people he meets because he forgets everything in a matter of minutes.
There is also a subplot involving a man named Sammy (Stephen Tobolowsky) who suffered from a similar condition--and every scene involving him is in black and white--that distracts us a little, but is somewhat crucial to the overall plot.
As I said before, I was confused after watching it the first time. I then decided to watch the movie in an unconventional way. I watched all of the black and white scenes first (which represent the earliest parts of the story), going past all of the color scenes. I then watched the color scenes backwards, from the ending to the beginning, which made the film look as if it was not told backwards at all. I did this not only to understand the plot a little better, but to make sure the story didn't have any holes (I recommend this only be done if you are watching the DVD, needless to say). It did have one or two, but it doesn't matter. I believe the director's goal was to confuse the audience a bit, perhaps so we can get an idea of what the protagonist's mindset was. I found myself having similar facial expressions to Leonard throughout the movie.
Overall, it was a very enjoyable movie, any way you watch it. I recommend it.
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RyanSpradlin [ 9.0 ]
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Different is good.
The idea of telling a story in reverse order seems impossible. Usually these types of movies seem rushed and sloped together. In a typical movie of similar methods the end wouldn't add up, and they would introduce some left field facts to force the pieces of the puzzle together. Memento doesn't employ the usual cheap tricks that leave the viewer cheated and disappointed. Everything here adds up. The story is told through a sequence of past and present, memory and lack thereof. The characters are all met long after they’ve been introduced to the plot. This makes for an interesting game for the viewer. We are left to watch and try to figure out who fits where and why. Fortunately, everything falls perfectly into place by the end and the finale is fully realized and justified.
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brandon [ 9.0 ]
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this rating is based directly following my first viewing of the film (i intend to return tomorrow .. and while i doubt it'll affect my rating, the possibility is very existant).
i'm sure you all have already heard the basic premise, so i'll keep it short .. leonard shelby (guy pearce) suffered brain damage during an attack where his wife was raped and killed, and now he suffers from short term memory loss. his mission in life is to find the man who killed her, and take vengeance.
the film starts at the end of the film (or rather, at the most recent time event, and travels backwards in five-ten minute segments). it's an ingenious idea, and it works out very well .. and, in effect, almost every jump back in time carries with it it's own little twist .. or rather, not so much a twist, but serves to answer the question "so how did this scene start?" in ways you might never have imagined.
so, after viewing the film, i'm left trying to piece together what i saw, and it's a very trying task indeed. some things i'm able to understand, other things i'm still very confused about. however, there are no real glaring plot errors that are robbing me of the pleasure of the puzzle (as are often evident in shoddily made suspense films).
hopefully, after viewing the film again tomorrow, a few more questions will be answered, a few more will be raised, and the absence of plot errors will remain the same ..
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Mohawk [ 9.5 ]
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A film of true class. An idea that could of been overly complicated and even silly is done in such a way that it is intriguing, dynamic and compelling.
A gem of a movie mixed in the garbarge we get today.
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Corto [ 8.5 ]
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A fresh piece of art among the commercial films of today. An ingenious script and the solid direction by Christopher Nolan make this one of the best films of the past few years.
I was especially attracted by Nolan's innovation in the field of epistemology. The leading character's attemps on builiding an artificial rational bases of his life (by tattooing his body and using polaroid snap shots) was invalidated in the end and therefore this film is one of the few purely empirical films ever made. Maybe Nolan is a new David Hume!
I also loved the way this film used color as a statement; isn't it really so that world/life from an objective point of view is, more or less, black & white and colorful when seen from a subjective viewpoint - here from the point of view of the leading character.
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jeff_v [ 9.0 ]
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A bona-fide mindf***, Memento puts a fresh spin on film noir. The less you know about it going into it, the better. Let's just say memory can't always be trusted....
Further notes:
The story and how it's told though are important to understanding the world that
is presented in the film. Starting a story at the ending and tracking backwards
to the
beginning gives each character's story an inevitability. Their actions already
have consequences, their lives already have fates. The predestined
doom of the protagonist is a Film Noir trope. It conveys a world in which the
big sleep is the final equalizer and our lives are worth only what we
make of them. For Leonard Shelby this is explicit. His existence is minute to
minute; he is only who he is for fifteen minutes at a time. He could
be someone completely different in fifteen minutes. Leonard's is an extreme case
of the fear of mortality. Wiped out and reborn every quarter of
an hour, he wants to extend his lifespan by giving himself a purpose, a
continued identity that crosses several fifteen-minute lives. His purpose is
to find his wife's killer. However, there's a doom to this plan because if he
ever does find his wife's killer then his identity, his life, is over again.
Thus he must, at the same time as he continually pursues the killer, ensure that
he never achieves his goal. In our own lives we create stories
and fabricate plans for the sole purpose of keeping us going, assuring us that
there's a reason for being here (one could say religion is the most
prevalent of our stories). Without a direction, we wouldn't live. Without the
momentum that memory provides us, we wouldn't be able to attach
significance to anything.
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JD [ 7.0 ]
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One word comes to mind - INTERESTING. That I give it. But, creative genius this is not, and that is why rating this movie is very difficult. Definitely a suspenseful film, and much credit should be given to the director because the film's sequences are in reverse and the suspense is still created. But, after it's all said and done, too much is unexplained which is okay to a degree, but it's not okay when there are enough plot holes to drive a bus through. Why does Mr. G. go back with Leonard to the abondoned building when he saw what Leonard was capable of from the beginning? I enjoyed the premise of the film until the disappointing ending. As a concept film it has much to offer, as an all around great film, it does not.
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Love_Spoon [ 8.0 ]
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The most original and creative film I've seen since I watched Run, Lola, Run a few months ago. If the series of chronological events in a story can be compared to the letters in the alphabet, then Memento plays out like this:
XYZ, VWX, TUV, RST, PQR, NOP, LMN, JKL, HIJ, FGH, DEF, BCD, A.
A really odd way to put a film together, but an immensely enjoyable one. A man (Guy Pearce) and his wife are robbed, she is raped and killed, and he gets a nasty bump on the head that prevents him from forming a short term memory. He trains himself to write himself notes, which is his only link to the future. At the same time, he tries to find the man who committed the crime, and exact his revenge. Very cool show.
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Timbo139 [ 9.0 ]
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Excellent! Original and creative format make this movie one of the most surprising and entertaining flicks I've seen in a while. The slightly hard to follow plot comes full circle like a Tarantino movie and makes this disturbing and thought provoking movie completely worthwhile.
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KIL [ 7.5 ]
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What a good movie! I like a lot! Please also see my 1st written published work: the book: MEAT by Mark Kilgore. A spell-binding 'journey of introspection'. You will see more clearly! Based on a 'divine contact' experience, MEAT passes on 'The Message'. MEATBOOK.NET
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| Weighted Rating | : 7.9 |
| No. Ratings | : 33 | |
| No. Reviews | : 20 | |
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