I have a slight obssesion with 'Memento' at the moment as I love it -Christopher Nolan has to be one of my all time favourite directors. I also think the tatoos look ultra-cool though I'd never be able to have them all done. Still. It's a nice thought. Has anyone else seen this film?
I thought it was gimmicky. Played normally, it would be just a plain mystery. Nothing special. Didn't see what the fuss was. What else has the director done??
I really liked it but I think Irreversible took the reverse storyline and ended up the better film. Has anyone watched the alternate version where the film is shown chronologically from beginning to end?
"all TG is good TG, even when it was punishing mind dreck!" -JP '06
youre all mad, Memento is brilliant and alot better that Irreversible (not to mention alot more original). I've watched Memento in the right order and its still awesome. the performances are just so memorable (no pun intended) and strong, Memento is fantastic!
"I'm the Dude! That's what you call me, you know... That or His Dudeness, Duder, El Dudarino..." - The Big Lebowski
"My life is a dark room. One big dark room." - BeetleJuice
Sane stamp or no sane stamp you must all be mad in order not to like 'Memneto'. How can you find it 'gimmicky'!? And actually you can see it 'played normally',- there's a hidden feature on the disk which shows the film in chronological order and it's still fantastic.Christopher Nolan (the director) has done quite alot of stuff but besides Memento the best movies he's directed were Batman Begins, Insomnia and Following.
I like it - though 'Memento' contrasts the present tense with flashbacks - which isn't that revolutionary - a film like 'Last Year at Marienbad', 'Hiroshima Mon Amour' or 'L'Aventura' were playing these kind of narrative games in the late 1950s/early 60s! & the structure itself is borrwed from a Harold Pinter play - 'Betrayal'? I assume the fact it was in the English language made people think it's groundbreaking? It's the best film Christopher Nolan's made so far - not hard when you look at the weak cover version of 'Insomnia' and the so-so 'Batman Begins' . 'Irrerversible' is a much, much greater work that really uses the backwards notion to great effect - the denoument where we reach the happy beginning and a reference to the 'Stargate' sequence of '2001' almost makes me think '2001' is great!
"See you on doomsday!"- Sadegh Hedayat's suicide note
Not just gimmicky, there's really many interesting facets to the film and the performances. So much so that I happen to know that its not just Film courses that use this film as a teaching tool. You should go back and watch it again, you might get something different this time.
i really liked it, i think its one of them you can watch over and over. not yet watched it in the right order, basically its lots of film for your pennies.
Originally posted by Blakess: Just because the idea of mixing the present with flashbacks isn't new it dosen't mean that it isn't worthy of appreciation.
But does it warrant all the reverance and notions that it is somehow ground breaking in its approach to the form? I thought it was alright but I didn't see a film overcome the fact it's using approaches others have made before to greater effect. Like 'The Usual Suspects' it's art cinema from American origin...doing the kind of things that the rest of the world were doing ages ago...
"See you on doomsday!"- Sadegh Hedayat's suicide note
I can see what you're saying but I think that although the idea of using flashbacks and mixing tenses may not be original the film still works in a way that other films using the same idea didn't: Guy Peirce's acting is brillaint and I think the tragic romance of his quest combined with the black humour makes the film worth watching and although it isn't 'groundbreaking' it deserved all compliments it received and is shot perfectly.
