Memento

Christopher Nolan, USA, 2000, 113 minutes

Imagine a world in which you cannot create new memories, blindly trusting what is written by your own hand. Lenny has just this problem. He develops this unfortunate condition after recieving a knock to the head coming to his wife’s aid after she is raped and brutally attacked late one night in their home. He is forced to live his life by conditioned routine and by systematised notes and polaroid photographs. Bent on revenge Lenny is relentless in his pursuit of the assailant, aiding his less than perfect memory by tattooing onto his body any important information he collects.

During the course of his quest for validation Lenny encounters Natalie and Teddy, who are feeding him contradictory information. Lenny is torn, whom does he trust? Eventually, Lenny is forced to trust neither due his ephemeral memories, comprising all the words he can fit on the bottom of a polaroid picture. Just to add an extra twist to this film, the scenes play in reverse order and while difficult to get your head around at first, ultimately the structure functions as a clever allegory of short-term memory, as Lenny and the viewers piece together the events that preceded the current action.

Directed by Christopher Nolan (preceding his remake of Insomnia), the story was written by his older brother, and both collaborated on the screenplay. This film is one of the complex masterpieces of 2000’s cinema.

Review by Jane Birch
Written for EUFS Programme Autumn 2004