Finally saw the much-discussed Memento last night. Wow, what a mind-twisting movie. I know the narrative style is what most people talk about, but there’s a bit more to it than just telling the story in reverse.
Of course, I was hoping that the DVD we rented would be capable of showing the movie in chronological order, but that is reserved for Region 2 or Special Edition versions of the flick, so we only saw it as Chris Nolan intended it to be seen.
I love Joe Pantoliano normally, and he certainly stole the show in Memento. Not that Guy Pearce was bad, just that his character is required to be somewhat lost and Pantoliano’s Teddy was able to be a lot more animated. For some reason Joe Pantoliano reminds me of Joe Pesci.
As Ang is going through the Modernist movement in her literature class, this movie was certainly timely for us, although I wasn’t thinking of studying when I saw it on the shelf – it was mainly a counterpoint to the animated dreck that Alex got to rent.
Slaughterhouse Five is probably the earliest non-sequential popular story, but Memento got much press for being unique 2 years ago. Hardly unique, the reverse chronology sure does make you confused for the first few scenes. By the time we got a handle on what was going on, Nolan threw the biggest twist on perceptions and assumptions at us.
I’ll stop here so as to not spoil the movie for any who have not seen it, but it sure was a good cinematic experience, even if it was in our living room.
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I’ve been leary of renting that. Many people say it’s a great movie, others say it gave them a headache.
At the risk of sounding like an arrogant asshole, the movie will only give you a headache if you are less than smart. It’s not really any more difficult to follow than most mystery movies, so long as you realize at the very beginning that the narrative is run in reverse.
You know, not to encourage arrogant behavior, but we had much the same assessment of “The Royal Tenenbaums”. Every person we met who liked it was of a higher intelligence….those who hated it, well, we figure they just didn’t get it.