Good, But Let's Get Going Here

Rating: 9/10 (23 October 2002)

Christopher Nolan's follow-up to `Memento' proves he's the real deal when it comes to directing--he's got an eye for arresting images and works well with his editor--but he's going to have to wean himself off the gimmicky techniques that have distinguished him thus far. Here, the surprise provided is minor (it's cribbed from `Memento') and essentially visualizes what has been repeatedly verbalized throughout; it renders the effect as clever but showy. The theme is truth--not defining it but simply telling it, and with such a one-dimensional topic the film becomes overly moralistic, an embarrassingly simplistic adult bedtime story. Al Pacino plays an L.A. detective lent to a small-town Alaskan police force to solve the murder of a teenage girl; he brings a lot of baggage with him, mainly his partner (Martin Donovan) who intends to cut a deal on an internal affairs investigation that would probably implicate Pacino. When he accidentally kills Donovan in a stakeout, the only witness is the girl's killer (Robin Williams) who wants to cut a deal of his own. The second half, the pas-de-deux between Pacino and Williams, is where everything bogs down; like `Memento' you keep waiting for it to get to the end to see if you've matched wits. Unfortunately, you've outwitted it: it ends in the most predictable way possible. Williams brings a nice understatement to his role but Al Pacino is, as usual, Al Pacino: speaking with an accent that hints of the South, you get the impression Pacino's spent a lot of time developing a backstory to his character--too bad it doesn't seem that interesting a backstory. It would be nice to see Nolan try his hand at something outside the suspense genre lest he allow himself to get trapped into making the same film over and over again.