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I started the script after reading about it in one of those screenwriting books and learning that Carrie-Anne Moss was in it...
Written by Christopher Nolan based on his brother's short story "Memento Mori"
One part of the story is told beginning, middle, end and in black and white. The second part is told backwards and in color. But both parts tells the story of Leonard Shelby who suffers from short-termed memory loss but is determined on seeking vengeance on his wife's murderer despite his handicap. As he searches, he meets Natalie, the bartender who helps him but has other plans for Leonard. And Leonard meets Teddy who is way more than he pretends to be.
I liked it a lot because it showed the end of Leonard's quest at the very beginning and with every new scene you see Teddy and Leonard's relationship through all new layers. What I didn't like was that I was hoping to see Leonard deciding he was going to devote his entire new life on looking for his wife's killer. But instead I see Leonard about to go into a tattoo parlor. But, that's the only thing I didn't like about it. The script gave you a sense of disorientation Leonard was feeling. Everytime there was a new scene, it didn't match the last one.
I thought it was a great movie. And it is definately not a standard murder mystery - it's not a mystery at all. The movie opens with him "figuring out who the killer is" and killing him, the mystery only starts as you go into the film and can't figure out how this guy could be the killer.
It's a psychological thriller, and it is about figuring out who is what, the murder playing a much lesser role.
Btw, it's not really based on the story. The way I heard it, Chris Nolan saw his brother writing the story and got interested in the idea. The story was only finished after the movie came out. The final results are completely different.
And whatever people tell you, the movie is not alinear. It is very linear, just - backwards.
but the black and white parts are told forward, but they happened before the colored parts. That doesn't sound linear. And I read the short story and you're right, only the premis of a man yearning for a revenge for his wife's murder because he can't feel time is the same in both stories.
I’m sorry. I just thought this movie was God-awful. The backward gimmick served no real purpose other than to annoy. It’s sad that running scene-for-scene backward was the only way he could give this any originality.
It was so full of plot holes, it was ridiculous. My boyfriend and I were just trying to point out all the plot holes one night and we had to quit discussing it because the plot holes just wouldn’t end.
He supposedly couldn’t form any new memories but yet he did all the time. He always remembered to take pictures, to look at the pictures, to make notes, to look at the notes. He even remembered to keep going back to a car that wasn’t even his car. He steals a car and continuously remembers the car even though he can’t remember he stole it. He couldn’t remember where he got his initial tattoo from yet he was able to learn how to give himself crude tattoos. I mean, the plot holes are endless.
Sorry, I know some people like it but I can’t in good conscience give it a good review. It’s simply bad. And painstakingly boring to boot, not mention overlong.
The plot holes you speak of are explained away to some extent by the whole Sammy Jankis storyline. We are led to believe that Leonard's condition does not exist and that his 3 minute memory is merely a way for his subconscious to cope with his wife's rape. In the end (beginning), the truth about Leonard's wife is revealed, yet he chooses not to believe it and continue searching for his wife's killer. This is where he writes "don't believe his lies" on the photo. His subconscious can't accept the truth about his wife, so it makes up an alternate reality which gives his life a purpose.
As for the car, it's a while since I saw it, but didn't he have a photo of the car which was parked outside his hotel?
That said, I don't fully understand it myself, and there are some loose ends that are never tied up. However, purely as entertainment, I thought this movie was excellent and not at all boring.
Stories like this inevitably have plot holes, it's all about how you paper over the cracks. I mean, look at Terminator or 12 Monkeys and tell me they are plausible. Time travel never ever works yet we're quite happy to suspend our disbelief for the sake of entertainment.
The movie iself was well filmed, edited and acted just thought the premis was very weak and ultimately led to a confusing film with too many holes in its plot.
This movie is not on its own, there are many other examples out there.
An example of pure craft is CHINATOWN directed by Roman Polanski, now that is a fantastic movie..
I totally agree with you on Chinatown, and I was in no way comparing the two. I wouldn't say Memento is one of the greats, not by a long shot, but it does have its merits. I like a movie that leaves you with something to think about. I even like movies that are almost impossible to figure out ala David Lynch. Memento is no masterpiece, but it attempted something different and I think it succeeded. Some might see the backwards plot as a gimmick, but I saw it as a decent innovation. It's one of those movies that keeps you guessing, even if you never reach a satisfying conclusion. It's also a good example of what you can do with a small cast and a limited budget.
I don’t recall it being established that his condition wasn’t real. With the previous story about the guy who couldn’t form new memories, the condition was real. So maybe the main character was only imitating that guy? I don’t know.
If in fact he couldn’t form new memories, it wouldn’t matter if he had a picture of his car in front of his hotel because the car would be in a different spot once he drove it somewhere and he shouldn’t remember where.
One of two things should have happened: 1) either his condition should not be real, in which case he’s an idiot because it was so obvious that he did in fact have the ability to remember things, or 2) the condition was real and the movie is stuffed with plot holes. Either way, it was just unbelievably flawed, I thought.
I love David Lynch and I don’t find his movies as incomprehensible as people say if one is willing to look beyond convention. I think David Lynch is fantastic and I believe, like him or not, people like him are necessary to provoke originality from everyone else. That’s why I’m such a huge Kubrick fan. He’s wild and original, yet he has a little more cohesion to his stories and gives me the full effect, so to speak.
Memento, though? I just didn’t find the backward scenes thing original or creative in any way. It’s certainly not the first movie to have scenes out of sequence. It just came off as really gimmicky to me. I totally respect your opinion. In fact, it prompts me to reconsider (and I really respect your research with caffeine ). But I just didn’t think the movie was very good at all.
I don�t recall it being established that his condition wasn�t real. With the previous story about the guy who couldn�t form new memories, the condition was real. So maybe the main character was only imitating that guy? I don�t know.
Okay, it's a while since I saw it so you can probably disregard my comment about his condition not being real. What I meant was that it's not as simple as being unable to form new memories.
The way it's revealed at the end, we discover that Sammy Jankis didn't have a wife, and therefore Leonard had subconsiously merged his own memories with his memory of Sammy. Leonard's wife didn't die when she was raped, she died later when Leonard injected her with insulin.
Therefore, if Leonard is capable of remembering his wife's death (albeit in a confused context) which occured after his accident, he is capable of forming new memories. However, his subconscious prevents him from truly remembering killing his wife, so he invents a situation where she was murdered and the killer is still at large. Thus giving his life a new purpose: revenge.
Yes, it does make sense. It’s been a while since I’ve seen it as well and I don’t recall the revelation that Sammy didn’t have a wife.
Michael (my boyfriend) says he vaguely recalls the possibility that a character may have glossed over the condition not being real.
Your explanation makes it a lot better. If that’s not the intention of the writer, it should have been.
Honestly, I have to say, the whole timeline thing was far more detrimental to the movie than any plot points. Some of the points you’re making would have been much more considerable if it weren’t for that backward scene gimmick.
As far as I’m concerned, it was totally unnecessary and really hurt the cohesiveness of the film. If it had benefited the story in some way, I’d say, “great idea,” but it didn’t. It just made it muddled and confusing unnecessarily. Especially with a plot that’s so complex. Stuff like that just makes me think the producers are trying to hide the plot holes.
But yes, I understand what you’re saying. And thank you for an insightful explanation. I’d have to watch the movie again to see if I think you’re right (and I’m definitely not excited about the notion of watching this movie again), but I appreciate the food for thought.
(POST CONTAINS SPOILERS) the backwards narrative to me I think worked absolutely perfectly because it put us in his shoes. We know what he's doing to do but we have no clue what he's just done just as he does. The story is then about finding out the motives of a guy who doesn't remember his motives himself. It's one of my favorite movies of all time and I'll admit it's confusing but that doesn't mean it makes no sense or is full of plot holes. I'll try to clarify a few of them but I may leave stuff out so sorry in advance.
To hit on what Martin said, I think that he interpretated the film differently. I hesitate to use the words wrong or right because I've been on IMDB discussing this exact thing. I don't believe that Leonard kiled his wife with the penicilin, that was just Teddy tricking him and then he got so confused and the flashback indicated that. I feel that it's supposed to cast doubt into our minds just as it does Leonards but in the end it doesn't make much of a difference as it's just a subplot, I don't think it's trying to imply that his wife wasn't murdered.
**however, an argument people make for that point is that if you watch one of the black and white scenes with Sammy Jenkis in a mental institution it flicks to Leonard for just a second in that institution which makes me think that Nolan was implying his eventual fate. I don't know if it was trying to say if Leonard was Sammy or just that Leonard would eventually end up crazy in the same way and be committed. The DVD I have also contains note cards on Leonard after he's being checking into a mental institution. However, I still don't think that adds up to the Leonard being Sammy and killing his wife deal**
As for Breannes comment about how he remembered stuff he did it through condition and pictures. I'm pretty sure he always took the picture of the cars and things and learning to write stuff down was probably done through conditioning. I don't think it ever says how long ago his wife died so he could have had a while to get used to having to take pictures of everything. Again, in the Sammy Jenkins back story it explains that conditioning should have made for new learning.
Martin, I'd be interested to hear what you think about my theory and Breanne, I think you should definetly give it another view. Maybe there are plot holes that I am overlooking as I was obsessed with this movie when it came out and I tend to overlook plotholes when I really like a movie but I do feel there are explanations for what you mentioned.
The movie specifically says that he can form no new memories. It’s impossible to learn or “condition” without the use of memory. Therefore, if his condition is real, everything he learns or uses memory to do is a plot hole. You simply cannot learn without the use of memory. Period. He would be like the other guy, basically a zombie.
If his condition is the result of insanity, then I would be willing to reconsider my opinion because that would change everything.
As far as the backward scenes, however, I’m sorry. I simply cannot believe they are necessary. I still believe it’s just a gimmick.
I’m not saying the movie didn’t have potential. It had a lot going for it. I just don’t think it ultimately worked. I’m the kind of viewer/reader who will forgive a lot of problems with a movie, even a less than satisfying payoff, even boredom, if I think the experience is ultimately good. This movie, however, I found to be a failure for me in the overall experience of it.
Breanne has made a good argument for her assertions regarding the holes in the plot.. A lot of the criticisms she and I are referring to is the believability of the loss of a ‘short-term memory’..
A 'short-term memory'.. This is part of our perception which as humans we require to function..
Don't get me wrong, the premise for 'Memento' is real clever but unfortunately the unraveling of the narrative does not work because we as an audience are expected to blindly accept that the main character is suffering from 'short-term memory loss' and that he can solve problems of what has gone before when he has no memory of what went before. That's the biggest hole there is right there! The device used by the story-teller fails to recognize that he has constructed a main character who uses alternative mechanisms substituting these for his memory but he is unable to remember anything else about people and or events so how can he use stuff that he can't remember is connected to the events or people or not..
See what I mean? The explanation for a character with no memory using a device or additional devices to gain information of which his memory is unable to retain is futile because as soon as he wakes up the next day (using this as an example) his lack of short term-memory means he would have forgot what he did yesterday.. In fact, he may just wander into a burger joint order a meal and coke, read a paper and wonder to himself "now, what was it I did yesterday? For the love of Mike, I can't remember." The character’s pockets would be full of photographs, writing on scraps of paper, telephone numbers and each day he wakes he won’t know the significance of them because he has no memory.. Seems obvious to me.
There are varying degrees to how a person suffers with the loss of 'short-term memory'.. 'Short-term memory' refers to what we did today, yesterday, this morning.. Long-term memory refers to your life experiences the very stuff that make you who you are.. Gradually over time your sort-term memory becomes assimilated into your long-term memory, some stuff is discarded but the important stuff that your brain decides is important to you is retained..
There is a third element to memory and this is called 'trace memory'.. This refers to what happens now at this very moment.. Anything you do or say or see let’s say experience via your perception is brought into your ‘trace memory’ this is then fed into your 'short-term memory'. Only later does this information become filtered and assimilated into your 'long-term' memory.
Therefore, the criticisms are not directly related towards the character’s behavior via his ‘long-term memory’, he will remember he had a wife, can drive a car, who his name is, all manner of stuff actually. It’s the loss of the ‘short-term memory’ which poses the real problem because if one suffers from a loss of this then it inhibits the memory of events which happened in that very ‘short-term memory’ You can’t be selective with what stuff the character will conveniently forget and at the same time use physical devices as an attempt to stimulate that ‘short-term memory’ because he hasn’t got one to be stimulated.
If the main character has an accomplice, and ally who took notes and kept both him and the audience up-to-date about the back history and the unfolding information which enables a tying-in of history then this would communicate to both the character and the audience the very information we need to know.
As it is, we as an audience are expected to suspend our belief that the device used for the main character. i.e. ‘short-term memory loss’ can be substituted by something else.. This is simply not possible without the help from an additional character who does not suffer from this memory loss..
If you are unfortunate to suffer from ‘short-term memory loss’ then you’ll be stranded like a ship lost at sea.. Everyday you will not be able to remember what happened the day before. You will be stuck in a loop only being able to remember the stuff before the fatal memory loss occurred and nothing more..
This is the very major fault with the movie..
You either accept the author's premise and enjoy the movie for what it is..
Alternatively you are a rational being, you know that the loss of ‘short-term memory’ means a human is unable to function correctly on those levels which require memory and as a consequence you reject the author’s premise and are able to comfortably assert that the story does not work because of the failing of the device used for the main character. As a consequence, any believability in the movie is lost because of the knowledge you have about the concept of ‘short-term memory’. The suspension of disbelief is broken, the story falls flat on its face all because of a poor premise which does not work.
It’s all about questioning the premise. If it works for you then fine, I don’t won’t to spoil your enjoyment of this movie. For myself, and Breanne it seems, it simply doesn’t work.
If I remember correctly, I don’t remember saying that..
So you're suggesting that when you suspend disbelief, you fail to be a rational being?
I think the one point you're missing is that, through conditioning, Leonard IS able to form new memories. Sammy Jankis was faking his condition. This was revealed in the way that he continually failed to 'learn' which electrified items to avoid when he was tested. This proved that he was a fraud. Leonard supposedly develops the real condition which allows him to remember certain things through conditioning. This very fact is reiterated several times throughout the movie. The notion that if he repeats something enough times, he 'should' be able to remember it. Since the events of the film supposedly take place a year after his wife's death, is it not possible that he has a long term memory of these events albeit in a jumbled format. Would looking at the same tattoos every day for a year make him remember the significance of what is written? Quite possibly. I think if a movie defines its own set of rules and adheres to those rules, we can suspend our disbelief and enjoy the ride.
By your logic, our knowledge of the paradox of time travel makes it impossible to enjoy any movie that uses time travel as a device.
Time Travel is Science Fiction and we do suspend our belief with these forms of fiction in order to comprehend.. This is our appreciation of it.. I reckon we all agree to these concepts as a social construction of reality.. It’s a cultural thing common to Western thought based upon science and reasoning, mathematics, religion, law and other socially constructed institutions. I believe German academic literature was at the forefront of this very argument in the early part of the 20th Century.
When something is rooted in a ‘reality’ I feel it must at least reflect that reality. If a concept bends the rules of reality, so to speak, then this is cheating.. This is why in my opinion, I consider the plot in ‘Momento’ to have a large hole.. In this particular example I mean..
For me I need to feel comfortable about reality because it means a lot to me, it locates me in a moment within a universe of chaos.. Otherwise logics have no meaning and everything we perceive is simply constructs of screenwriters.. I prefer an agreed perceptual reality.. I don't mind it blurred around the edges, particularly stories which test my understanding of my above statement but the concept better be a sound one otherwise I use my bullshit meter and if it looks and feels as if it fails my test then it falls flat on its face.
There is a difference.. One is ’so’ and the other is ‘nay’.. Which position would you adopt based upon the concept of logic. Memory or having no memory
But, people can still enjoy this movie if they ignore that reality is being bent here..
My comments are simply an opinion, admittedly adopting a position of an agreed social construction, rather than a deconstruction of a social construction of reality just to work as a plot device, but it is an opinion just the same, but opposite.
I think it shows that Memento is rooted in reality and that the reality is a lot more complicated than 'memory' or 'no memory'.
Anyway, you don't like the movie and that's fair enough. I respect your opinion. But I'm of the opinion that, although flawed, Memento is a little more plausible than you give it credit for.
I know you said you’ve already posted your last post and I don’t want to provoke you. I understand why because this could go on forever and I would also like to get out of this conversation at some point. But I would like to say something.
I think you make some very valid points. I’ve been thinking about what you said and I think you touched upon an important aspect of this whole thing when you spoke about suspending disbelief. I’m wondering now if the problem for me with this film doesn’t lie not in an implausible premise so much as in its inability to get me to suspend disbelief.
We all must suspend disbelief to some degree to watch any movie. Even a drama based on a true life story requires the viewer to ignore that they’re watching a movie and accept the actors and scene cuts, etc. So I think the question here is really now, why did this movie fall so short for me in getting me to suspend disbelief? And I’ve basically concluded that the reasons are often shallow. We suspend disbelief for a film when it shows us what we want to see.
I’ll do a comparison of The Terminator and Memento to demonstrate.
I saw The Terminator in the theater when it came out. I recall the audience really getting into it and really loving it. It doesn’t seem so original now because it’s been so endlessly copied but at the time, it was very innovative. It was an immediate box office success. But why?
I thought about it. And as I remember, people went on and on about the action. They talked about Arnold smashing and shooting stuff. And then there was the quotable dialogue. “Come with me if you want to live!” And of course the now trademark Arnold, “I’ll be back.” The plot holes were the last thing people talked about and then they were just glossed over and then people moved on.
For me, there was also the woman who, though simple and ignored in her everyday life, was so important that a man would travel through time to give his life to defend her. It carried with it a tragic love story very similar to the romance of a wartime epic. And in the middle of an action flick.
People wanted to believe it because it was exciting and quick paced and, aside from the time travel element, relatively tight and simple. It started out with a naked Arnold Schwarzenegger ripping a guy’s heart out. And then comes a naked Michael Biehn (who for my money is one of the most handsome and sexy men I’ve ever seen) to save the day. I’ve already mentioned the Linda Hamilton character which really resonated with me (and I think a lot of women).
Cameron structured it so that it gave us every reason to want to suspend disbelief.
Of course, something doesn’t have to be action to do that. One of my favorite movies of all time (if not the) is A Tale of Two Cities with Ronald Coleman. I don’t believe for five seconds that it was really possible for a man to switch places with a man in prison, but the idea of a man loving a woman so much that he would rather give his own life for her to be with the man she truly loved is such a staggering and moving notion that the viewer wants to witness it so bad as to forget the rationale and simply experience it.
Now to Memento. While pondering these things, I think I finally realized why it ultimately failed for me. I thought about my viewing experience. When I first started watching the movie, I was excited. I’d heard it was good and I’d wanted to see it for a while. It started out interesting.
After a while, though, I got tired of it. The backward scene thing was I think the first thing to start irritating me. I still don’t find it necessary. It was very, very (I can’t stress this enough) annoying.
Then there was the main character. I know he’s got a memory problem and I tried to forgive him for this but the character was just so flat for me. He was just the same in every scene. He never changed or grew and transformed in any way. Again, I realize he had a memory problem. I’ve watched movies about families where a loved one had Alzheimer’s but I felt for the characters, the torn apart family and the poor parent or grandparent sadly losing their precious memories of the people they most cherished. I was touched by it. But the character in Memento just wasn’t able to evoke those kinds of feelings.
Its inability to make me care about the characters allowed me to reinstate disbelief and start rationalizing the story. From there, it just fell apart.
Anyway, sorry this is so long.
The last thing I want to say is that everything I say is my opinion. Just because I say a movie is bad doesn’t mean it’s bad. It means just that I say it is. I’m not going to insert “this is just my opinion” into everything I say because I think it should be something that’s just understood. I know you know that. Just saying it for the record.
The movie may very well be a masterpiece for all I know. But when people dissect the particulars of a film, it can’t be good. I think how good a film is ultimately depends on whether the feedback is about the things that made you suspend disbelief or things that bug you when you’re unable to.
Like I said, I totally respect your opinion. And you may be right. Could be I just don’t see it.
Shelby's wife was murdered. Teddy told him she survived and that Leonard let her kill herself with insulin, but that's not true. Leonard remembered that she wasn't diabetic. After Leonard accuses him of lying, Teddy backtracks and says "okay.. I guess I can't make you believe what you don't want to be true." What really happened is that Shelby had already murdered the real "John G" but Teddy constructed the tale again to keep Leonard looking, like a demented little game for him to watch. Oh, and Teddy is really John Edward Gammel, a police officer who worked on Leonard's case. Anyway, just to clear that up. I liked it. I don't care that other people don't like it, I loved it.
impulse, that is just one of the explanations if you go to the link that dr mabuse gave it explains a theory about how leonard did kill his wife with incelin and from what i read it made sense i interpretated the exact way you did but the other one is quite plausible too... im not sure if youre supposed to know which is real
I don't care that other people don't like it, I loved it.
That's an expression of your freedom of choice, to illustrate you have a valid opinion.. Hey that's great..
On the other side of the debate it's referred to as an alternative viewpoint, a lot of people have them regarding religion, law, political systems, sexual orientation, food, and, I could go on all day here, all manner of things..
To not care suggests you fail to see the point based upon your own heavily biased opinion rather than show respect of the existence of another opinion..
You don't neccesarily have to agree with somebody else's opinion to recognize an alternative exists out there.
This is the beauty of ideas, that somebody sees the world a little differently to yourself. This is the very stuff that make me and you different...
I always find it funny when people say they don’t care what other people think. There’s a tremendous difference between saying that and something like, “I care what other people think but I don’t let that dictate my view.”
I’ve said it before and I’m saying it now. People do care what other people think and people who say they don’t are lying. Sorry to be so blunt but it’s the truth. People do care what other people think. You wouldn’t feel the need to point out how much you don’t care if you really didn’t care.
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). But I just didn’t think the movie was very good at all.
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