Memento

This is the shit you sit and watch the entire credits for. I have re-watched Memento a few times now, and while no viewing has managed to capture the initial awe of my first viewing, the story is constructed in such a complicated manner that I'm still finding new things to appreciate despite knowing the plot inside and out. I call Memento 'my favourite film ever' for three major reasons; the character of Leonard Shelby, the (imo) perfect plot twists, and the meta impact that the sequencing of the film has on the viewer. I don't think that Memento is flawless, and there are other films I've seen that are more polished and less open to critique than it, but for me the incredible degree to which the Nolan brothers crafted those three aspects outweighs any problems I can identify in the film by a landslide. To talk about Leonard Shelby without spoiling the movie is nearly impossible. In some senses, the discovery of who Leonard really is, or who he has become, is the central point of the film itself. Since I'm trying write a spoiler free review (so that YOU go and watch the movie) my thoughts will be vaguer than I'd like. Leonard narrates the entire film, and, more than in most other films, is truly the only lens through which the audience experiences the setting. I did the maths, and Leonard is on screen for nearly 70% of the film's runtime, which is a much higher percentage than any other lead in Nolan's other films (Joseph Cooper is in 3rd and is only on screen for 50% of Interstellar for comparison). Furthermore, of the moments Leonard is off screen, almost all of them take place (ironically) in his memories and recounts of past events. I bring up these statistics because (along with stats being fun) they show how important of a character Leonard is, and also how restricted the audience remains to his perspective. This is not only thematically important, but also necessary to deeply invest the audience in Leonard's circumstance. Even subconsciously, the film begins to teach the audience his unique mannerisms, patterns, and routines which he requires to live his life. There are obvious things, like the 'I have this condition' line that he recites to everyone, and the polaroids he constantly consults and edits, that everyone will notice on their first viewing, but there are also more subtle behaviours, like how he tries to assess whether he's met someone before, that continue to impress me each time I watch the movie. This is, of course, only possible due to Guy Pearce's generational performance (he's a criminally underrated actor and the #1 reason I'm looking forward to watching The Brutalist).  There's a sentiment I've seen online that Nolan films, especially those like Memento that are seen as hard to get your head around, have traded emotional substance for storytelling gimmicks and style. Perhaps this is a product of the unusual way in which Leonard's trauma is explored. Throughout the film, the audience catches glimpses of how existentially horrifying a condition like Leonard's is, but it is never explicit. Just as often, his condition is played off for humour (and the film is VERY funny in a dry way). The balance is so precarious that you could miss it initially, but some of the later scenes (like his interactions with the prostitute) make the reality of having one's freshest memories at all times be of the most horrific event in their entire life as revolting as they need to be for the audience to understand why Leonard is the way he is. In Attack on Titan, the character Kenny's last words are 'Everyone had to be drunk on somethin' to keep pushing on. Everyone... was a slave to somethin'. Leonard reminds me of this idea, yet his character raises the stakes completely. If we construct beacons to motivate us to walk along the road of life, Leonard is walking on a tight rope above an abyss, and the vengeance he seeks is the only thread keeping him from falling forever. Moving on to the plot twists, there is even less I can safely say without spoiling. I'll put it like this: it feels like a disservice to call them 'plot twists' as the term misconstrues their importance. Traditionally, a bad plot twist is one the writers forced into the story to spice up a bland plot, and a good plot twist is a cherry on top of an already amazing story, that allows the audience to re-contextualise what they have seen. In Memento, the 'plot twists' are essential for the story to function. I consider there to be two: one that directly incites the plot of the film, and is only revealed at the end due to the non-chronological nature of the movie, and one that completely changes the way that the audience understands Leonard, and what he has been able to do to himself. The primary reason this film is hard to grasp upon first viewing is that without a complete understanding of both of these 'twists', the story makes very little sense, both thematically and in its plot. Once they are understood, however, it is incredible how much they explain. Again, it feels degrading to say that they are 'foreshadowed', as the story is written around and branches off of them is such a way that the audience will have completed the entire puzzle and be left with only the outline of the final pieces in the centre by the time they are revealed. Since there's very little I can say without compromising this spoiler-free review, I'll leave this quote from the start of the film to look back on just how much the revelations the audience receives later in the film can add meaning and value to seemingly innocuous aspects of the earlier story:  'I use habit and routine to make my life possible. Sammy had no drive, no reason to make it work. Me? Yeah, I got a reason.' - Leonard Shelby Finally, and most importantly, there is the non-linear storytelling of the film. This is why I consider Memento to be my favourite film ever; I engage with it in a manner unique among all other movies I have watched. The story is told both chronologically and in reverse chronological order, with reverse scenes (shot in colour) telling the primary story interspersed with chronological scenes (shot in black and white) that initially are devoted to the back story of Leonard and his condition. The time-lines sync up at the end of the film (in the chronological middle of the story) for the final scene.  This is the only way this story could have been told. All that I wrote about the film engaging the audience with Leonard's way of life would be for nought if they had the memory that he lacks. By telling the story from the end first, the audience starts each scene just as confused as Leonard; in some unknown situation they do not understand. The magic of this structure goes beyond this, though. Unlike Leonard, the audience has intimate knowledge of all the future events, something they aren't usually afforded in other movies. This grants them the catharsis of understanding how Leonard ended up in the situation he starts a colour scene in at the end of the following scene. Yet between these two points they will also see how Leonard ended up in his situation at the start of the prior scene, as well as a brand new set of circumstances that were introduced at the start of the following scene. To add on to this, there is a black and white scene in between every two colour scenes that forces the audience to recall an entirely different story. In essence, I don't think it's easy to watch Memento, but the challenge of stitching together and reordering scenes in my mind while I watch the movie is one of the most rewarding experiences I've had consuming art in general. The fact that this process is also thematically relevant to the film is even more beautiful. It's this surgery that one must attempt when watching Memento that elevates it above my other favourite films and lands it as one of the most inspirational pieces of creativity I have ever witnessed. This might be the longest review on my profile, but 'Memento' deserves it. I did write this between the hours of 1 and 3 am though, so there's probably a lot of stupid errors that I'll have to edit this review to fix.  TLDR: www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5whnLZyKVA Tell me that's not peak cinema Btw I wrote this review before I’d seen Ran for the first time.